Beware the Calm
by padme's sister
Summary: Aeryn Storm isn't human, and her special abilities alarm and infuriate the Doctor at first. But when the kingdom comes under attack from a deadly and mysterious creature, it quickly becomes a race against time to save her kingdom, and the Doctor must decide if he can trust Aeryn before the hunters become the hunted. Post Hell Bent - Alternative Ending.
1. Hell Bent

**Author Note: Hey everyone! Wow, it's been a while since I wrote anything, but certain episodes of Doctor Who recently have inspired me! I'll admit, keeping in character with the Twelfth Doctor has been a little tricky, so at times if I slip into Tennant or Smith's Doctors, I do apologize, but then the way I see it, they're all the same character anyway, so that's my excuse and I'm sticking to it! Haha.**

 **First of all, do I really need to do the disclaimer? Oh I suppose I'd better. Though do I really need to tell you all that I don't own Doctor Who? The only thing I do own is the character of Aeryn (who's name can be pronounced either Erin or Air-in) and who you'll meet very shortly. (She's also on the front cover that I made, styling it like the actual Doctor Who books for the 12th Doctor).**

 **Anyway, a little background info on this story. I started writing it after Face the Raven, so of course at that time I had no idea how Heaven Sent or Hell Bent would go. But since watching both those episodes, I've gone back and tweaked a few areas of this story to accommodate them as well. Think of this as basically an alternative ending in which the Time Lords refused to let the Doctor extract Clara from her timeline and he was never able to save her. What would he do next?**

 **Well I'd like to think he'd do something like this. Hope you enjoy!**

* * *

Lush grasses sprinkled with flowers of all colours and shapes graced the hilly meadow in the clearing at the edge of the great forest. The snow that had covered it throughout the winter months was all but gone now with only a few small stubborn patches left, though they were already succumbing to the spring rays of sunshine that shone down over the area, giving everything a slightly golden hue.

Beyond the meadow's borders off in the distance, shining waterfalls spilled into fast flowing river, and petals from a nearby cherry blossom floated by on the warm breeze. Puffy clouds drifted across the shining blue sky above and it had become a place full of life and full of love, full of warmth and full of softness, after a harsh, cold and bitter winter.

Clara would have loved this place, the Doctor thought to himself sadly as he stood in the doorway of the TARDIS, leaning against the frame and surveying the surroundings dejectedly. Under normal circumstances, he'd have enjoyed this place too. It was very beautiful, he had to admit. But without the infectious enthusiasm of a certain bubbly young woman exclaiming and reveling in the beauty of it all as she twirled about on the spot, pointing out the various sights and wonders of this natural heaven, he just couldn't find the will to enjoy it by himself. Travelling alone was no fun. It never had been. That was why he always took his friends along with him. But it was too soon for that, and he simply couldn't bring himself to find anyone else.

Not yet.

Not when the pain was still too fresh and raw, the hurt still too much to bare.

But he'd keep on, just as he'd always done. Running away from his hurt and his pain. He'd run away from Gallifrey when they'd refused to let him use the time extraction machines to save Clara, and he'd keep running until it didn't hurt any more, just like he always did. To hell with the Time Lords and their stupid rules. To hell with the raven that had stolen his best friend from him. To hell with it all!

After he'd stolen another TARDIS and returned to London, to his beloved time machine, he'd sent the stolen TARDIS on a one way trip back to Gallifrey, hopped in his own and headed for the stars. And now, for whatever reason when he'd allowed her to pick the destination for him as a distraction for his tired, grief-stricken mind, she'd chosen to come here, to the planet Elysium, in the Darkrose Peninsula.

He'd sniffed at the irony of the name when he'd first read it on the monitor, not at all impressed. Because Elysium in Greek mythology was supposedly a place at the ends of the Earth where certain favoured heroes were conveyed by the Gods after death. It also could be translated as a place or state of perfect happiness.

Well, he couldn't have felt any less like a hero right then. How could he be any sort of a hero after everything he'd done recently? And everyone he'd failed?

And he certainly wasn't happy. He was the polar opposite in fact, and he wondered if this was some cruel joke his beloved machine was playing on him. But the TARDIS always took him where he was needed, even if it wasn't where he wanted to be, so he was willing to trust her judgement in this instance, and believe that it hadn't been a malicious joke on her part.

So, determined not to lose himself to the depression of his loneliness and grief again, he stepped out onto the soft, springy turf and reached behind him to pull the door closed, before giving the wood work an affectionate pat.

"I won't be long," he told her, even as his fingers found and began to trace over the remnants of one of the painted flowers that had adorned the front of the TARDIS for several weeks. The Time Vortex had burned away most of the graffiti, but a few flowers remained. They would vanish in time as well and the TARDIS would return to her familiar blue once more. Surprisingly she hadn't kicked up a fuss at being the canvas for Rigsy's tribute, however, and the Doctor had half heartedly teased her for a time about how she'd never really hated Clara after all. In the end, the TARDIS had been just as fond of her as he'd been. She wouldn't have allowed Rigsy to even get close with his paints, otherwise, let alone completely cover her in beautiful decorations in a floral tribute to the Impossible Girl.

Turning away, he looked to the sky. It was late afternoon, by his reckoning, so that didn't leave him much time to find out exactly which part of Elysium the TARDIS had brought him to, or why. Better get started then.

Hearing the distant sound of voices coming from behind him, in the depths of the huge expanse of forest that stretched as far as the eye could see in either direction, he figured this would be as good a place as any to start. Digging his hands into his trouser pockets, he started off.

He hadn't ventured very far into the forest, however, when he was stopped short by a terrified weasel bursting out in front of him. The creature skidded to a halt, ears pinned back flat against it's head, teeth bared, breathing hard. The Doctor knew a hunted creature when he saw one, but was helpless to do anything as the weasel took off again in a mad dash towards the cover of a fallen log.

Moments later a foxhound charged out of the bushes, baying and barking loudly as it followed the scent of the weasel. It charged straight past the Doctor and started to dig furiously around the log, scrabbling and scratching as it tried to get to the weasel, which was backed away inside, it's fur on end, hissing and snarling in fright.

"Hey, get lost! Go on, beat it!" The Doctor snapped, waving his arms at the dog. "Pick on someone your own size!"

Surprised, the dog backed away as the Doctor waved furiously at it, but only for a moment, before it curled it's lips back, bared it's fangs and began to growl furiously.

"Oh don't you give me that!" The Doctor growled right back. "Go on, get out of here! Leave the poor thing alo-"

The crack of a gunshot echoed throughout the forest, and several birds squawked in fright, launching from their perches among the branches of the trees. A man came striding through the undergrowth, a rifle in hand, muzzle still smoking a little, and whistled. The Foxhound obediently trotted back over to come to heel by his side, and he crouched down, reached into the log and pulled out the limp, lifeless weasel.

"Good lad Copper," he praised the dog, rubbing him affectionately between the ears. And then, seemingly for the first time, he noticed the Doctor. "Greetings stranger! Here to help? There's plenty of the little buggers to go round."

"That-" The Doctor raged as he stormed forward, "-was an innocent creature!"

"They're vermin," the guy shrugged as if this answered everything, slinging the rifle back over one shoulder and tucking the weasel's tale into his belt so that it hung limply by his side, next to five others that the Doctor had only just noticed – their tan fur slowly staining dark crimson as the blood slowly drained from them.

Normally, the Doctor wouldn't have cared so much about one little weasel. Yes, he hated innocent beings suffering, but he also understood the circle of life. Death was a part of that circle, whether he liked it or not. But killing for survival was one thing. Killing for sport was a whole other thing entirely.

And recent evens had changed his whole perspective on this circle, anyway. He'd seen enough death to last him a lifetime.

Storming forward, he grabbed the hunter by the collar, almost choking him in his anger. "You had no right to end a life like that! NO RIGHT!"

"It was vermin!" the hunter protested again as beside him, the foxhound began to growl, it's hackles rising as it sensed that it's master was in danger.

"Human beings are vermin!" The Doctor all but screamed at him. "Yet I've spent the last two millenia defending you! Saving you stupid little idiotic apes from the big wide universe! And this is the thanks I get?!"

"Kye….everything all right, man?" another hunter asked, stepping cautiously from the shadows of a large oak, rifle in hand.

"Oh, more of you silly little apes," the Doctor let go of the man called Kye and stepped back as all around him, hunters appeared, circling him with their rifles at hand in what he supposed was meant to be an intimidating gesture. Too bad he wasn't in the mood to humour them. "So who's in charge around here?"

"That would be me," one of the older members of the group stepped forward. The Doctor looked him up and down, then snorted in amusement.

"No seriously, who's in charge around here?" He asked again, looking to each man in turn. Then he made a vague gesture to the trees, and by extension the kingdom around them. "Who's in charge? The Head Honcho? The Big Guy? Your Lord and Master?"

"That would be the Governor," Kye stuttered. "Governor Storm."

"Governor Storm, eh? And he sent you out here today to kill these poor defenceless creatures?"

"It's a weasel cull," the elder hunter nodded. "We're following orders."

"It's an extermination! And of course you're just following orders. Like good little soldiers, I'll bet," the Doctor growled, rounding on him. "What's your name soldier?"

"Why do you need to know my name?"

"So I have a name to pin the blame on!"

"I'm not telling you until you tell us who the hell you are, and what your problem is!"

"My problem? MY problem?" The Doctor barked an incredulous laugh as he spun on the spot, looking to them all and addressing them all as one, raising an accusing finger to each in turn. "My problem is you lot!"

"And who are you, sir?" the elder hunter asked sharply, his own temper rising now to match the Doctor's. The Doctor looked to him for a moment, and smiled a cold, humorless smile.

"I'm the Doctor. And I wish to make a formal complaint against this mass murder that you're all guilty of. Take me to your leader!"

* * *

Aeryn Storm wasn't expecting the call from the hunters so soon. Sitting behind her desk, she'd been engrossed in some paperwork – notices of marriage that needed accepting or declining, planning permission by the Head Teacher over in Cheen village to extend a couple of the classrooms, a request for a permit by Farmer Cole to place traps in his field that would scare away the creatures that kept eating his crops.

She was so engrossed in fact that she didn't notice the communications terminal blinking at her until it began to bleep sharply. Biting back the cry of surprise, she dropped the current folder of paperwork back on the desk and reached out quickly to take the call, worried that it was some sort of emergency.

"Governess Storm speaking."

" _Pardon the interruption, Milady Governess,"_ Darl, one of the veteran hunters apologized sincerely, his voice ringing clearly into the office.

"Is everything all right, Darl?" She frowned, sitting up straighter in her chair.

" _Not exactly, Ma'am. We, uh...we've encountered a stranger in the woods and, well, he's demanding to see your father. He doesn't agree with the cull. I think he's one of those activists."_

"Did you tell him you had the Governor's permission?" she huffed. Those bloody activists were a real pain! They complained and kicked up a fuss about everything. Literally everything! Cutting down trees was cruel, killing vermin was cruel, eating meat was cruel, picking fruits and vegetables was cruel, plants had feelings too...it never stopped. Anything and everything was apparently cruel to them, and not for the first time, Aeryn found herself wondering how the hell they survived, if everything was 'cruel' and 'hurt something's feelings'.

 _"Yes Ma'am. That's why he's demanding to see your father now. Said he wants to make a formal complaint."_

"My father's busy," she groaned, placing her head in her hands as she knew what was coming next. As second in command, it was down to her to deal with things in her father's absence. Wondering if she'd end up regretting it, she sighed and looked up again. "Do you know who this guy is?"

" _Said his name was the Doctor, Ma'am."_

"The Doctor?" Now he had her attention. "Tall guy, silver hair, fierce eyebrows?"

 _"His eyebrows aren't the only part of him that's fierce, Ma'am!"_

"Bring him in, Darl. I'll speak to him myself."

 _"Yes Ma'am,"_ Darl replied obediently, before signing off.

The Doctor was back? Well that was great news! Aeryn was relieved beyond measure. Not only because she didn't have to deal with one of those bloody activists, but also because it was the Doctor. She knew the Doctor. He'd listen to her, and hopefully she could get this whole mess sorted out without her father ever having to find out. With any luck, Clara would be with him as well. She'd missed their girly chats since their last visit.

Standing up and stretching, because she'd really been sitting down for far too long, she gathered up the stacks of paperwork, shuffled them into a neat pile and set them on the shelf behind her desk, ready to return to later. Then she took her cloak from the back of the chair and fixed it over her suit, smoothing out a few imaginary creases. Might as well make herself presentable to the Doctor after all, so that he could see how high she'd now climbed since their last meeting. She wondered briefly if he'd approve, or be proud of her achievements.

Then, in one final preparation, she pressed another button on her communications terminal and waited patiently.

" _Yes Milady Governess?"_ someone answered politely. " _How can we serve you?"_

"I'm shortly going to be receiving an unexpected guest. Could you bring up a tray of refreshments please? I'm sorry it's such short notice, but as I said...his arrival was rather unexpected."

 _"Of course Milady, I'll bring something up right away."_

"Thank you." Letting go of the button, she wandered over to the mirror hanging on the far side of the room and adjusted a few strands of hair that had fallen from her braid. Then she eyed herself critically for a long moment.

"When did I get so thin?" she spoke aloud, raising a hand to her jaw and frowning. She looked tired as well. Pale and withdrawn. And her hair was definitely so much darker than she'd ever remembered it being before. It was almost as black as night now. Not such a good look for meeting the Doctor, but there was little she could do about it in such short notice.

She turned sharply as a commotion kicked off outside the room. Before she'd taken three steps towards it, however, the door was thrown open and the Doctor charged in, five men in tow, each of them with their hands bound behind their backs and linked by one long piece of rope, that the Doctor was dragging behind him.

"Over there," he barked, pointing them towards the far wall. "Stand. Stay! And on pain of death, nobody take a selfie! I can blow this entire place if I see so much as a single thing I don't like, and that includes karaoke and mime, so take no chances!"

Then he turned to Aeryn, before looking all around. "You're not the Governor. You must be his secretary. Run along and fetch him for me, there's a good girl."

"Doctor?" Aeryn asked, taken back by his attitude. "Doctor, it's me. Don't you...don't you remember?"

He studied her up and down. "Should I know you?"

"You don't remember," she realised with a sigh. "It was a long time ago, I suppose."

"Who are you?" the Doctor asked again, waving an impatient hand. "And how do you know I'm the Doctor?"

She stepped forward and looked up into his cold, furious eyes. "We've met before, Doctor. A long time ago, granted. Well it was for me. I guess you can just skip between times as and when you like. But trust me, we have met." She glanced past him, to the now empty doorway, expecting to see someone else. "Where's Clara? Her day off, I'm guessing? Wait…..you do let her have days off, don't you? Course you do. She couldn't teach otherwise…."

His eyes narrowed dangerously. "Shut up."

"Excuse me?" She asked, once again taken back by his attitude.

"I said shut up!" He snapped. "Not one more word. Do you hear me? Zip it!"

"But-"

"Ah!" He held up a finger sharply, and she immediately fell silent. "Now go and fetch the Governor. He and I need a little chat."

"The Governor's busy," she glared, standing taller all of a sudden, not at all liking this attitude of his. "So you can deal with me."

"His secretary? Pfft. No thanks."

"I'm his daughter, actually!"

"Oh?" The Doctor's eyebrow raised curiously, though he was still incredibly wound up about something. Something had put a bee in his proverbial bonnet and he was in a foul mood because of it. "Fine then, next best thing. What are you going to do about this lot?"

"Why do I need to do anything?" She asked, confused.

"We haven't done anything!" The hunter called Kye protested then, speaking up for the first time. "He took it upon himself to place us under arrest! Said we were gonna pay for what we'd done!"

"Oh you're going to pay, all right!" The Doctor rounded on the five men sharply. "Because let me tell you, I have seen enough death to last a thousand lifetimes! Innocent creatures that never hurt anybody! Thousands upon thousands of them, slaughtered by monsters like you! Monsters who think it's sport to pray on supposedly 'lesser' beings! I'm tired of it all! Tired of death and unforgivable actions and innocent creatures paying the price for the mistakes or the greed or the lust for power of others! Tired of people using death as an excuse! A means to justify an end! No more! Do you hear me?! NO MORE! Enough is enough!"

"We were just doing as we were told!" Kye argued back. Then winced at the sharp intake of breath from the Doctor.

"EXCUSES!" The Doctor roared. "NO MORE! You will pay, and maybe finally people will learn from your example!"

"Are you going to kill us?" Darl dared defiantly now, tugging his hands free of the ropes at last, surprised at how quickly the knots had come undone. The Doctor apparently wasn't very good at tying people up, it would seem.

The other men followed suit and now back on an even footing again, they all squared their shoulders and formed rank against the raging man before them.

The situation had spiralled rapidly out of control, and Aeryn knew if she didn't regain order quickly, all hell might literally break loose.

"If that's what it takes to stop you, then yes!" The Doctor cracked his knuckles as he raised himself to his full height, preparing for a fight.

"You kill us because you're tired of death?! Oh yes, that makes so much sense!" Kye retorted, bunching his hands into fists. "Pot, kettle, black much?!"

"Enough, all of you!" Aeryn snapped. But no-one was listening to her.

"No one else will die! Not on my watch!" The Doctor had also balled his hands into fists.

"Doctor, stop!" Aeryn cried furiously. "All of you stop!"

" 'No one else will die', he says!" Darl turned to his men, encouraging them, gearing them up for the fight that was to come. "Except us, it would seem!"

"I've faced far worse than you," the Doctor growled menacingly. "You think I'm scared? I'll show you the meaning of scared!"

"Doctor please!" Aeryn cried, begging him to hear her. Begging him to stop. But he couldn't. He was lost to his rage and his anger, and if he wasn't stopped soon, then someone was going to get hurt, and he would end up regretting this moment for the rest of his life. Because it may well be five on one, but she knew who the victor would be. And it wouldn't be the hunters.

She cast about the office furiously for something, anything, to help her. And then she caught a sudden wave of something – was that grief? - emanating from his mind. She hadn't even been using her powers at all, yet it hit her hard, it was so intense that she'd felt it without even trying. And then she knew what she had to do.

She didn't make a habit of reading people's minds normally – at least not without their permission. It was an invasion of privacy, and most people got rather defensive if they found out she'd seen inside their minds. But perhaps this time, just this once, it would give her the knowledge she needed to stop the Doctor before it was too late. Because whilst she'd met him before, a long time ago, he was still a stranger to her, and she got the feeling that he could be a very powerful and dangerous man, given the right motivations. But likewise he wasn't without reason. If she could find the right leverage, she could perhaps make him finally see sense?

Closing her eyes, she delved deep into his mind, extending her powers, letting them search and explore. His mind was so vast, so complicated with so many shut off doors and dead end corridors that it would have been so easy for her to get lost and never find her way back. But just as she was about to withdraw completely and give up, she saw her.

Young, brunette, small and petite, strikingly beautiful and bright eyed, smiling at something or other in the memory that Aeryn had now come across. Aeryn knew her name. Knew her better than she knew the Doctor in fact, because she'd met her too, again a long time ago. And the feelings the Doctor clearly held for her – well, that could just be the leverage Aeryn was looking for. It wasn't just this one memory he had either. There were more and more, flickering rapidly in quick succession, some where she was smiling, others where she was angry, some where she and the Doctor were hugging, some where they were arguing, one where the two of them were walking past a raven's cage in some strange little alley…

The wave of grief hit her with such force then, that she was literally propelled from his mind – kicked out violently and the door slammed shut in her face. But it didn't matter. She'd seen enough.

Keeping her eyes closed but focused on that one particular face, she listened to the voice she'd heard speaking to the Doctor, in his mind. And then she let the transformation happen – the familiar warm tingling sensation as every cell in her body changed in some form or another. She lost a few inches in height – she could tell that much even though her eyes were still closed – and her hair was shortening so that it sat about her shoulders.

When the warmth faded and she opened her eyes again, she took a deep breath and hoped and prayed that this would work.

"Doctor! For God's sakes, will you stop?!"

Her voice sounded strange now – a different voice, not her own – but one that had come from her mouth none-the-less.

The Doctor froze instantly. And then very slowly turned on the spot, his face morphing from one of anger into one of shock and disbelief, as he took in what he was seeing. Almost as if he were seeing a ghost.

Even the hunters had frozen, stunned by what they were witnessing. It was enough to give them pause, at least, and suddenly the intensity of the situation and the adrenaline of the coming fight drained away. They backed down first, but would the Doctor follow suit?

Before he could process everything and work out that it was just a trick and he wasn't truly seeing who he thought he was seeing, she pressed on. "Do I have your attention?!"

"Yes," he whispered quietly, his voice taking on a suddenly different emotion altogether. Great and terrible sadness…

But why? Why was he so upset by her taking on the appearance of Clara Oswald? Had something happened to Clara? Was that why she wasn't here with the Doctor now?

"Please, Doctor...let them go. What they've done is terrible, but look at them!" She begged him now, letting go of the restraint she'd been struggling with, whilst holding onto the physical transformation. As soon as she let go, she could feel the warm tingling again, as her cells realigned, she grew those few inches taller, her hair lengthened again back into it's twisted braid and she felt like herself once more.

Albeit with a trickle of blood slowly seeping from her nose. But that was a small price to pay, considering.

He stared at her for a moment longer in disbelief, before finally his face hardened and the sadness was locked away, back behind the severe mask she had come to associate with being his normal, impassive face in the short space of time that she'd known him.

"I think they've learnt their lesson, don't you?" She continued gently, stepping forward to appeal to him directly, forgetting everyone else in the room for that briefest of moments. "You wanted them to stop, and now they have. Isn't that enough? Can't you find the tiniest shred of forgiveness in one of those two hearts of yours?"

"How do you know I have two hearts?" He growled quietly, squaring up to her. So she stood her ground and answered with a pointed look of her own.

"You're not the only alien here, you know."

"No, I most certainly am not. You want me to deal with this lot? Then fine, but you hold onto that thought, because I'm not done with you yet."

"What's that supposed to mean?" She exclaimed as he turned his back on her, and stormed back over to the group of hunters, who hadn't dared to move since her revelation of her powers, except to bunch back together against the wall.

"Go on, all of you, get out," he told them now, pointing to the door. But when none of them immediately moved, he grabbed Kye by the scruff of the neck, hauled him forward and then all but threw him towards the door. "I said GET OUT! Before I change my mind! Go on! Get out!"

They didn't need telling again, and the four remaining men scampered out after their companion. It was safe to say they'd learned their lessons, and Aeryn knew that they wouldn't be causing trouble again. They knew better than to antagonize the Doctor any more. But what about the Doctor himself? Would he be the one causing her problems now?

She hoped not, but as he turned slowly back to face her again, she suddenly felt all the confidence drain away as if someone had pulled the plug. If looks could kill, she reasoned, then she'd probably have died about ten times over then. Maybe even a hundred.

"Thank you," she said the first thing that came to mind, just to break the awkward silence. His only reaction was to raise one of those suddenly incredibly fierce looking eyebrows. She gulped, took a step back – not afraid to admit that she was actually more than a little intimidated by him at that particular moment, and then found herself feeling the need to elaborate and explain, for lack of anything better to say. "For letting them go, I mean. I know you're tired of killing, and I understand. I really do. But it was necessa-"

"Oh no, you don't even go there!" He suddenly exploded, jamming an angry finger into her face so that it was mere millimeters from her nose. "You cannot justify their actions to me! And as for you - you had no right to do what you just did! NO RIGHT!"

"I-I..." she stuttered, trying to back away. But he followed her, stalking mercilessly, finger still raised to her face as he backed her into the desk and she almost fell, stumbling into it and banging her hip sharply. But she bit back the yell of pain, in lieu of the very angry Time Lord standing over her, breathing heavily, a fury unlike anything she'd ever seen before blazing in his eyes.

"I….I was just trying to help! You….you would have killed them!"

"Yes, I would have. And I am eternally grateful that you stopped me. But that's not why I'm cross! No, more than that. Furious, in fact! Do you want to know why I'm furious with you right now?!"

She wanted to say no, to tell him that whatever she'd done, she'd only been doing for the safety and protection of her father's people and that it really didn't warrant his anger. She didn't want him to lecture her like he'd lectured those poor, terrified men just moments earlier. Besides, she was the Governor's daughter – second in command of this whole kingdom! He was a stranger, and by default should have been deferring to her authority! So who the hell did he think he was, lording it over her like that and making her feel ten inches tall?

And yet despite his anger, there was something she DID actually want to know. And she had a feeling that that was in fact the reason he was angry. Not because she'd stopped him. But because of HOW she'd stopped him.

"Where is she?" She whispered, struggling to keep her voice from trembling, even as she once again looked to the door, expecting to see her. "Clara….where is she?"

"She's gone! And I don't know how you know about her, but let me tell you she was a far better woman than you'll ever be!" And without another word, he spun on his heel and stormed from the room, leaving her in a state of shock at his outburst. Sinking into the chair behind her desk, she massaged her throbbing hip and took several deep breaths to try and calm herself, though she very much doubted her heart would return to normal any time soon. At the moment it was currently trying to pound it's way through her rib cage, and the ragged breaths she continually pulled into her lungs kept hitching at the end, as though she'd been running and crying and screaming all in one.

Did the Doctor have this effect on everyone he met?

No, not everyone, she realised, leaning an elbow on the desk and resting her forehead in her palm. She'd seen inside his mind. She knew the kind of man he could be, and she knew that something so very terrible must have happened, to make him the man he was now. It didn't take a genius to work out what.


	2. Listen

**Author Note: I'm not entirely convinced with the Doctor's anger in the last chapter if I'm being brutally honest, but it served it's purpose, and hopefully now he'll start behaving more like the Doctor again. Anyway, what do you think so far?**

 **Constructive criticism is always welcome, of course :D**

 **And reviews are always appreciated, haha.**

* * *

What the hell had that stupid, idiotic pudding brain been doing, poking about inside his head like that! How dare she?! What gave her the right to do that?! And to use Clara against him like that – well that was unforgivable!

How did she even know about Clara anyway? How did she know him? He'd certainly never met her before – he'd have remembered. A striking face such as hers, long, dark raven hair, intense emerald eyes with flecks of gold swirling in them like the time vortex itself, pale skin – deathly pale in fact. Almost like she was sick. It wasn't a healthy look. And she looked tired as well, withdrawn, overworked.

But that surprisingly didn't detract from the natural beauty she still somehow held. A beauty that you only had to scratch the surface to find. No, he'd most definitely have remembered encountering her at some point in the past. So they couldn't have met. It was impossible.

But then how did she know Clara?! Was that another trick, to mess with his mind?

And talking about messing with his mind, those powers of hers! Not only had she read his mind – invaded it without his permission, he might add! But she'd done it without even making physical contact with him. He'd felt her poking and prodding about, and had been forced to quickly shut a lot of his mind off from her in defence of the invasion. But she shouldn't have been able to do that in the first place! It was impossible for a human!

Though of course, she'd already told him that she wasn't human. Had she just been saying that? Or was it true? Sure, there were plenty of human-looking races out there, many of which had been around long before the humans. Humans were still fairly young by comparison, and had stolen the look, claiming it as their own, in their naivety. But if she was one of these much more ancient races, that only raised the question of which one? And why was she hiding in plain sight amongst humans? He'd seen the looks on those hunter's faces. She clearly didn't use her powers often. That might even have been the first time she'd ever revealed them, in fact, in her desperation.

The mind powers could be hidden with a lot of care, but then there was the cellular transformation to consider as well. She'd taken on a completely new look, transforming herself physically into a whole other person. And not just in looks. She'd adjusted her voice to suit as well. It was a handy trick – great for disguises and fancy dress parties – but not when she used it against him like that! She'd taken his biggest weakness and used it, and he'd fallen for it, hook, line and sinker. Idiot! Stupid, stupid idiot!

He paused at a window and glanced out to the sun setting beyond the mountains on the horizon. Leaning forward, he gripped the ledge so tightly that his knuckles turned white, and then he closed his eyes and took a deep breath in, tasting the stillness in the air for the first time. It was unnatural, eerie even, and his eyes snapped back open again in an instant, his rage forgotten as confusion took over.

Something was wrong. Very wrong.

Straining to hear anything out of the ordinary, that was when he realised. He couldn't hear anything. At all! There was no sound, no bird song, no wind rustling the leaves of the trees...nothing. Just a deathly silence, broken only by the sound of his own breathing.

"Hello, hello?" He spoke aloud, testing to make sure that he hadn't actually gone deaf. His voice echoed into the silence, both relieving him and alarming him at the same time. Because in all honesty it would have been so much easier if it had been him who had lost his hearing. But no, his hearing was still just as sharp as ever.

"Not good," he declared aloud, spinning on the spot once, then twice, then licking his finger and holding it aloft, then licking it again just to double check that he wasn't mistaken, not at all liking what he was tasting. "Oh very not good."

Diving into his pockets, he searched around for the sonic shades and gave a triumphant little 'ah' when he was finally able to pull them free and set them over his eyes. Pushing them up his nose, he set the scanner working, then turned in a very slow circle to get a three hundred and sixty degree scan, before whipping them off again and jamming them back into his pocket.

"Not-human Girl!" He bellowed as he started back for the room he'd not long ago exited, hoping that she'd still be there. Bursting through the door, he was relieved to see that indeed she was. She'd removed her cloak once more and thrown it back over the chair. She'd also removed the jacket of her dark grey suit and undone the white blouse to reveal a black tank top beneath, giving her a much more relaxed, casual look now. She wasn't in 'Governess' mode any more. Which was fine by him. He hated authority figures, anyway.

"Not-human Girl!" He exclaimed triumphantly, having no idea of what her real name was, so just making one up for her like he so often did whenever he couldn't be bothered to learn someone's name. Or didn't like the name they were given, so decided to give them a new one of his own choosing. His exclamation made her flinch violently and stare at him in alarm. But again he hadn't noticed.

"There you are! This way, I need you. Come on." He beckoned madly for her to follow, but she was staring at him as though he had five heads. A quick check over either shoulder confirmed that he didn't – though it never hurt just to be sure. You never knew what could happen to you, any more. Especially in this strange amalgamation of a place. It was almost like medieval fantasy meets sci- fi space station. They were in a draughty old castle, full of suits of armour and swords and shields hanging from the walls, but electricity flowed everywhere and powered everything from lights to very high tech communication terminals.

"Hey Not-human Girl," he called to her again, making a grand sweeping gesture towards the door. "Your kingdom is in danger. Let's go save it!"

This, at least, got her moving as she pulled herself from the chair, wincing as she placed weight on her right foot. No, not her foot, he realised. Her hip. Must have been where she'd banged it against the table. Never mind, she'd live.

"I have a name, you know!" She snapped at him as he continued to make urgent motions towards the door. "And what the hell is going on?"

"Your kingdom is dead. Your people will also be dead soon, if you don't hurry!" he told her simply as he started to stride off, not even bothering to check that she was keeping up. He was so used to having Clara stride along by his side, matching him step for step, already thinking ahead as he was now, that it had completely slipped his mind. Clara was no longer with him. And this stranger was exactly that. A stranger, who didn't know him even though she said she did, and who didn't know his ways, didn't understand how he worked. But likewise it meant he didn't know how she worked either. Or how she'd react to the things he said.

"Is that a threat, Doctor?"

The anger in her own voice then was enough to finally give him pause, and he stopped to look back at her. "Well of course it is." Her brow furrowed into a scowl, and he mentally went back over what he'd said, only to realise his mistake. "But not from me," he quickly added as an afterthought, taking a spear from one of the suits of armour that lined this particular corridor. He threw it to her, and she caught it, looking to it in confusion.

"For your leg," he motioned, imitating a person using a walking stick. "You're very slow without proper mobility and you'll only hold us up. That should help."

"I'm pretty sure I can think of better things to do with it!" She growled, and he grinned, nodding.

"Fighting spirit, good. That's good. You'll be needing that soon enough. Come along then Hoppity, let's go find your father and save the day."

"Hoppity?!" She cried in outrage. "I have a name! And I swear, if you don't tell me what the hell's going on, I'll- "

"You'll-?" He prompted curiously. But before she could reply, he gave a great sigh akin to a school teacher trying to deal with a particularly difficult pupil – then immediately regretted that analogy as it only reminded him of Clara. She'd always been brilliant at controlling unruly kids. If only he had her skill at crowd control.

Still, now wasn't the time. Because Governess Hoppity – or whatever her name was – was glaring at him as though he were stark raving mad. Perhaps he had better explain. He needed her co-operation, after all.

"Listen..." he told her, starting back in her direction. And then he waited. And she stared at him still, like he was insane. And all around them, silence reigned.

"To what?" She huffed at last, deciding to just give in and play along with whatever mad game he was playing.

"Exactly! There's nothing to hear! There's nothing. Anywhere. This is the silence before the storm. And do you know what it's telling you?"

Her head had tilted now, as she strained to hear anything. But he was right. And it was unnatural. Steadily, the hairs on the back of her neck began to stand on end, and a cold shiver ran down her spine. "What?" She whispered, suddenly afraid to speak out loud into the unnatural silence.

"Beware the calm."

And just like that he was moving again, she was forced to hobble to keep up, and much to her chagrin, the spear did actually help her to walk, as she was able to lean her weight more against it, and less against her wounded hip. Damn her bloody fragile body to hell right now!

"Doctor, wait! Doctor!" Limping after him, she found herself wondering, and not for the first time that day, when she was going to wake up from this nightmare.

* * *

The Governor was in his office, deliberating over tomorrow's town council meeting notes, when the door flew open and a tall gentleman with silver hair breezed in.

"Are you sure it's this one?" He was calling to someone over his shoulder.

"Doctor, you can't just barge in!" Aeryn was shouting to him from a little further back down the corridor.

"Oh I don't do knocking. Knocking's for boring people." He then turned to the Governor. "Hello there. You must be Daddy. I'm afraid I might have broken your daughter. Sorry about that."

"What?!" The Governor exclaimed, standing up so violently in his outrage that his chair threatened to topple over completely. "Who the hell are you?! And where's my Aeryn?!"

"I'm here Dad," Aeryn grumbled as she limped in, thrust the spear into the Doctor's hand, then sunk into one of the plush, comfy sofas with a loud, pained groan.

"As I said, I may have broken her. But I'm sure she'll be fine."

"Speak for me again, I'll shove that spear where the sun don't shine!" Aeryn growled at him. Then she looked to her dad and offered him a reassuring smile. "I'll be fine. Just barked by hip on a table."

"Aeryn, you should get that seen to," her father sighed, stepping out from behind his desk and moving over to her, crouching down in front of her. "Perhaps I should call the doctor?"

"Oh no need, I'm right here," the silver haired man grinned manically. The Governor looked from him, to his daughter, then back again.

"It's all right Dad, he's with me," Aeryn agreed, against her better judgement. And then she sat up in the chair. "Listen, something's not right. Out there."

"What do you mean?"

"Your kingdom is dead, sir. And unless you do something about it quickly, your people will die too."

"Is that a threat?!" The Governor roared, leaping to his feet and rounding on the Doctor, who threw his hands up in disbelief.

"Why does everyone automatically assume that I'm the threat?!"

"Dad, the Doctor's here to help," Aeryn started, before pausing and studying the Doctor up and down for a long moment. "He's…..he's angry, and he's alone, and yes he is quite possibly dangerous and insane. But...I think we can trust him."

"You 'think' you can trust him?" The Governor didn't sound convinced, but Aeryn just nodded.

"Yes. He's here to help."

"First sensible thing you've said all day," the Doctor nodded to her. "Now then, tell me how long has it been quiet like this?"

"It's always quiet," the Governor frowned. "It's evening, most people have gone home for the day now."

"No, no, I mean really quiet. Like 'end of the world', quiet," the Doctor started pacing back and forth. After the short silence that followed, he stopped and looked to them both incredulously. "You don't know, do you." It was a statement, not a question. "Oh you stupid, boring little pudding brains! Your kingdom is dying and you've not even noticed?!"

"How dare you!" the Governor roared again, storming over to his desk. "I think it's time you left now, sir!" He pressed the red button on his communicator and began to speak. "Guards! Now! We have an intruder who needs escorting off the premises!"

"So you don't want my help? Well fine by me!" The Doctor had once again matched her father's tone and volume as he stormed over and leant on the desk, glaring her father right in the eye. "But don't say I didn't warn you. Don't come crying to me when-"

"This morning," Aeryn suddenly interrupted as she remembered something. "Doctor….there was life out there this morning."

"You're sure?" he asked, his tone once again changing in an instant, this time to one of calm composure, as she struggled to sit up in the chair, wincing again and sliding one hand down to hold her throbbing hip.

"I'm positive," she nodded, as the more she thought about it, the more it made sense. "The hunters went out this morning. They arrived back with those cartloads of trophies. Because that's what got you so angry in the first place – that they'd killed innocent life for sport."

"Good," he rubbed his hands together and nodded for her to continue. "Now you're thinking. Now you're being smart."

"So, there must have been life out there, for them to have been able to catch anything. Otherwise they'd have come back empty handed! The silence came AFTER their return. So it could only have happened an hour ago, at most!" She realised triumphantly, putting the pieces together, just as the Doctor had already done, long before he'd even entered the office. He'd been way ahead of them, and was now waiting for them to catch up. Though it seemed like she hadn't disappointed him this time. She'd made the connection on her own, unlike her father who was still looking as confused as ever by everything.

"Brilliant, well done! I'd give you a gold star if I had any, but I must have left them in my other jacket." The Doctor turned to her father. "You see what she's done? She's worked it out. She's smart. You could learn a thing or two from her. But right now, we all need to learn something else. Something incredibly important."

"Which is?" The Governor was quite clearly getting himself more and more flustered now, not sure what to believe.

But again, Aeryn was now ahead of him, and thinking along the same lines as the Doctor. "Why is it silent?"

"TWO gold stars for the only other intelligent life form on this planet apart from me!" The Doctor had already started for the door. "Come along Hoppity, let's find out shall we?"

"For God's sake Doctor, I have a name!" Aeryn snapped as she struggled back to her feet and limped after him, pushing past the guards who had finally arrived. The Governor sunk back into the chair behind his desk and waved them away tiredly. Whatever his daughter was getting herself into was her own business now. She was, he hated to admit, a grown woman now and he couldn't keep mollycoddling her any more. No matter how hard he tried.


	3. Into the Woods

**Author Note: Thank you so much to everyone who's favourited or decided to follow this story so far. It means a lot that I'm not just writing random rubbish, and people actually like it :D**

 **I was worried for a while, which was why I didn't post this story sooner, but now that I've started, watch this space!**

* * *

"Why are you limping?" The Doctor asked conversationally as he and Aeryn made their way through the corridors and down the stairs to the lower levels of the castle, intending to go outside. "You didn't knock yourself that hard. I saw."

"Because I wasn't lying when I said I wasn't human," she winced, awkwardly navigating the stairs by gripping onto the bannister railing and shuffling down each step, one at a time. "I'm not from around here. Wasn't even born on this planet."

"That sounds like an answer I'd give. Doesn't explain anything though," the Doctor frowned, pausing at the bottom and bobbing on the balls of his feet in his impatience to get going.

"I have a...a 'disorder'," she spoke the word in disgust, clearly hating the very idea of it and very reluctant to admit it. "The slightest tap and bones break, the slightest scratch and I bleed out. I bruise more easily than a peach and chances are I've now cracked my hip because of that little 'knock' you're referring to. My father had a hell of a time when I was growing up. You know what kids are like. All skinned knees and bruised elbows? With me...I was forever in and out of the infirmary. Because a scratch was never just a scratch and a bruise was never just a bruise."

"Must have been tough," the Doctor nodded, holding out a hand to help her down the last few steps in a rather unexpected gesture of sympathy. "And I'm guessing your father's wrapped you in cotton wool and hasn't let you out of his sight ever since?"

"Something like that," she nodded, pausing for a moment to catch her breath and massage the painful throb as she leaned against the railing at the bottom of the last step. "When I started to express my dreams to go off travelling, maybe even find out where I really came from, he did everything he could to dissuade me. In the end, he made me Governess just to keep me here, because he knew I couldn't run from my responsibilities. At first I hated him for it. I felt like he was trapping me here against my will….but as I came to understand my...my 'disorder' more, I came to realise that he'd only done it to protect me. How can I hate him for wanting to keep me safe?"

The Doctor had fallen strangely silent, and she could see that haunted look had returned to his eye again. As tempting as it was to read his mind and find out what was going on inside, she resisted – remembering how upset he'd become last time she'd done it – and not willing to bring back the angry Doctor instead of this more curious, more friendly Doctor who was at least now being civil towards her and had seemed to have momentarily forgotten his anger, she stood up straight again, testing the weight on her wounded leg. "Anyway, don't worry about me. I'll be fine. Let's keep going, shall we? I might not have been born on this planet, but it's my home. And I'll be damned if I'm gonna stand back and watch it die around me, starting with this very kingdom."

The hint of a smile tugged at the Doctor's lips and he nodded. "All right then, Hoppity."

"Doctor," she groaned, about to reprimand him for not using her actual name – yet again. But when he looked to her expectantly, for some reason she just couldn't find it in her heart to correct him. All of a sudden it was like she was seeing him in a new light. And if him calling her Hoppity was just one of his little tricks to help him get through each minute of each hour, then so be it. So she smiled and nodded. "Let's go save the world."

* * *

Outside it was even more eerily quiet than it had been inside. And that was saying something! The Doctor was right when he said there was nothing at all. There wasn't even the hint of a breeze in the air, and yet she found herself shivering regardless.

"Where do we start?" She whispered, once again afraid, for some inexplicable reason, to talk any louder than a whisper.

"I'm not sure," the Doctor replied in an equally hushed voice – humoring her? Or because he was feeling the same about talking too loud?

She watched as he licked a finger then held it in the air.

"Doctor, there's no wind," she frowned. "I can tell you that without having to-"

He placed his finger in his mouth and sucked it for a moment, and she shook her head, deciding that this must be some weird fetish that she really didn't need to know about.

"Dead," he nodded decisively as he removed his finger from his mouth and looked around. "The air is dead. There's death everywhere. I suspect – and I very much hope I'm wrong, but let's face it, I'm never wrong – this castle is the last living thing left in this part of the kingdom right now. You, me, your father and anyone else inside those walls. We're all that's left. And if there's anyone still out there in the other towns and villages, they won't have long."

She shivered again and looked longingly back towards the solid wooden oak doors behind them. Her head was telling her to get the hell back inside, to stay safe and hope that whatever was going on, it would leave them be. But her heart was telling her that the Doctor wouldn't rest until he'd solved the mystery. He seemed like that kind of guy. And right now for whatever reason, she felt safest by his side. Now that he wasn't raging at her for the little stunt she'd pulled earlier, that was.

Though if she'd cracked her hip as a result, then perhaps he saw that as suitable punishment, and was now willing to let bygones be bygones?

"We can't be all that's left," she shook her head then, resolutely turning away from the oak doors that would lead back inside, having made up her mind that wherever the Doctor would go, she would follow. "Because something's killing everything. And it's still out there."

He gave her an impressed, albeit sideways glance, and she could see the hint of a smile tugging at his face again.

"Want to go and introduce yourself?" He offered.

"To a deadly killer alien of unknown origin? Would love to," she lied, holding her head high in stubborn defiance of her own fear.

"Who says it's alien?"

"This planet is full of humans – with the exception of us and my father, of course. But have you ever come across anything of human origin that could kill an entire planet?"

"You don't give humans nearly enough credit," he sighed. "Destructive creatures, the lot of them."

"I still say it's alien," she argued lightly, if only to keep the silence from consuming them as they started off into the unknown, the Doctor seemingly picking a direction at random and striding off confidently, then pausing every now and then to allow her to catch up again.

"Like you and I?" the Doctor willingly went along with the conversation, for the same reasoning as Aeryn – to keep the silence at bay, because it was incredibly unnerving, even for him.

"We at least look human," she shrugged, carefully navigating her way over a particularly rocky patch of ground. "This thing, whatever it is, could look like anything. Which is actually a good point. How do we know what we're looking for?"

"We don't," the Doctor shook his head, took out his sonic shades and slipped them on to scan the area around them as they went. "But as you said, it's the only thing alive out here apart from us, so it shouldn't be too hard to find."

* * *

Three hours later, they were still looking. Or rather, the Doctor was half way up a tree, scanning everywhere with his shades whilst Aeryn had slumped at the bottom, her back leaning against the trunk, one leg pulled up close so that she could hug it against the cold – because now that night had well and truly fallen, it was becoming bitterly cold - and her wounded leg stretched out in front of her was aching like hell.

In fact it was only this pain that flared randomly at various intervals that was keeping her awake. Otherwise she'd have fallen asleep a long time ago – and out here that could be a potentially life threatening mistake to make.

"Can you see anything yet?" She called up into the thick leafy canopy above her now, no longer afraid of how loud she was being.

"Some lovely views of a lake and some mountains. You should really see this, Hoppity! It's stunning!"

"Bad leg, remember?" She sighed, shifting a little then gritting her teeth against the pain that flared anew.

There was a loud crack from above, and she froze, then slowly turned her head skyward as the Doctor's voice called out above the sound of rustling branches and muted thuds, like something was falling through them. "Look out below!"

Suddenly a branch was coming her way, and she let out a scream of surprise, throwing herself to the side just in time to avoid being flattened. It was only by some small miracle that she remembered to land on her good side, and not her already damaged hip, saving her from further harm. Though she did taste the bitter, metallic taste of blood in her mouth and quickly came to the realisation that she'd somehow put a tooth through her bottom lip, splitting it open.

"Doctor! That almost killed me!" She exclaimed, before spitting a mouthful of blood to the ground and dabbing at her lip with her sleeve in an effort to try and stop the bleeding – even though she knew it was no use. It would keep bleeding until she got it seen to now, so all she could do was regularly wipe away the blood as it dribbled down her chin, and curse the Doctor continually under her breath.

"Don't be so dramatic," he called back down to her. "You're talking, aren't you?"

"Well obviously!"

"Then you're alive, so no harm done."

"Bloody alien," she grumbled, staggering to her feet, brushing off the dirt and leaves as best she could, then examining the branch for a moment. It wasn't particularly big, truth be told, though it would still have hurt like hell if it had hit her.

"Doctor?" She called back up.

"What is it now? Can't you see I'm busy?"

"Have you got a torch? Or some matches, or something?"

There was silence for a moment, and then something dropped to the ground a few feet away, landing with a dull thud in the soft earth. It took her a moment to find it in the dark, but soon she realised that it was indeed a torch. And lying beside it, a box of matches.

Well if the Doctor was going to keep doing what he was doing, then she might as well be getting on with something as well. Namely getting a fire going so that she didn't freeze to death before they found their killer alien.

Stripping the smaller twigs and leaves from the branch, she piled them into a little mound, set some stones around the edge and then gathered some dried grass. Striking a couple of matches, she set them in the center and coaxed the flames gently to take hold. Once the fire was going steadily after being fed a few more twigs and sticks, she then turned her attention to the fallen branch, using the torch to examine it closely. It was actually about the right height, she realised, for her to use as a cane. That might come in handy, then, because there was no way she was going anywhere in a hurry at the moment, and if they needed to run for their life, or fight their way out, at least she'd be armed with something.

Had the Doctor done that on purpose? Or had it truly just been a happy accident that he'd stepped on a branch that had given way beneath his feet but was so conveniently shaped like a cane and just so happened to be the right height for her to use?

Aeryn had never been one to believe in happy accidents, or mere coincidences, so she made a mental note to either thank the Doctor, or throttle him when he eventually came back down from his bloody tree again, then settled herself back against it's trunk, now at least a little happier because she had some warmth and the comfortable crackling of the fire to keep her company.

Which, as it turned out, was a bad idea in the long run. In theory, the fire should have kept her safe and warm. In actuality, it had made her sleepy, and blinded her to the darkness beyond the flames, so that by the time she realised that she was no longer alone, it was too late.

The scream had barely built in her throat, however, when a hand darted out and clamped firmly over her mouth.

"Shut up," the Doctor hissed, crouching down beside her and kicking dirt over the fire to put it out. Once she'd overcome the initial shock, Aeryn nodded to show that she was back with him and knew to be quiet, though she was still breathing hard from the fright and for the second time that day, her heart was trying to hammer it's way out through her chest.

The Doctor kept his hand clamped over her mouth for a moment longer as he looked all around them, and then very slowly he removed it.

"Listen," he whispered urgently, but also in a voice barely audible. It was so quiet in fact that she'd had to strain to hear it. And hearing anything over the sound of her breathing as she fought to get it back under control again was impossible. So instead she took a deep breath in, held it and closed her eyes, forcing herself to focus with her ears, and listen.

Nothing but silence, and the pounding of her heart. She was about to say as much, when she heard it. The snap of a twig – very, very faint. The pad of something touching down in the soft earth, again incredibly faint. The slightest of breaths, the rustle of leaves as something brushed past them….they weren't alone. And no matter how hard the thing...the 'creature' was trying to remain quiet, the silence had betrayed it.

Letting go of the breath she'd been holding as quietly and carefully as she could, she opened her eyes and nodded to the Doctor again, to confirm that she'd heard what he had.

He stood up slowly and held a hand out to help her up, then passed her the branch, which she gripped tightly, her whole body trembling in anticipation of the fight – or flight – that was to come.

"Can you read it's mind?" the Doctor hissed into her ear, leaning in so close that his breath, warm as it was, sent a shiver down the back of her neck.

"I'll try," she hissed back. Then, extending her hand out in front of her, palm outwards, she stretched out with her powers, searching, feeling, imagining invisible tendrils of power twisting away out from her hand and sliding off into the darkness.

"What are you, a Jedi?"

"Shut up!" She snapped, glaring at him. "Unless you can do it any better?"

He made a gesture with his hands for her to continue.

Her attention had momentarily lapsed thanks to the Doctor, but as soon as she put all of her energy and focus back into what she was doing, she felt it. The mind of whatever – or whoever – was out there. Pushing her powers further, she entered their mind -

And gasped in shock, withdrawing again in an instant, as a lone figure came stumbling through the bushes in confusion, gripping his head. The Doctor made to spring forward, but Aeryn threw out a hand to hold him back. "No Doctor, wait! It's okay, he's one of us!"

"You're sure?"

"Positive! Captain Kyon, are you all right?"

"Governess Storm, I felt….I felt you inside my head," the soldier gasped, dropping to one knee to catch his breath.

"Yeah, sorry about that," she cringed, knowing that she probably should have been a little gentler. But as far as she'd been concerned, some killer alien was about to attack her and the Doctor. She hadn't been able to afford the luxury of caution, or softness with her powers. "It's a long story. Anyway, what are you even doing out here?"

"Your father's worried sick about you," the Captain replied as he finally pulled himself back to his feet, and hefted his rifle back into a more comfortable position in his arms. "When you didn't return after nightfall, he sent the cavalry out to look for you. Said you were injured, and had been kidnapped by -" Finally noticing the Doctor, he backed away, raising his rifle, finger hovering dangerously close to the trigger.

"Whoa, whoa Captain!" Aeryn exclaimed, quickly stepping between the barrel of his gun and the Doctor, who was looking more than a little insulted. "The Doctor's on our side! And I'm fine, honestly!"

"If he's on our side, why did your father…?" Captain Kyon started, even as Aeryn reached out, placed a hand gently on the barrel of the rifle, and pushed it down so that it pointed to the ground.

"You're having to do a lot of reassuring that we're all on the same side, Governess 'Storm'," the Doctor spoke up from behind her then, putting a particular emphasis on her surname, which she didn't like the sound of. In fact, she was pretty certain right about then, that she preferred it when he called her Hoppity. "How can you be so sure?"

She rounded on him sharply, biting back the pain that flared up her hip and down her leg. "Because I've seen inside your mind. I've seen inside the Captain's mind. I can tell you both exactly what you're thinking right now, and you both want to do whatever it takes to keep me safe, and solve the riddle of this silence! Am I right? Go on, tell me I'm right," she dared defiantly.

The Doctor looked to her for a moment, his face eerie in the harsh moonlight filtering through the leaves of the canopy above. And then he smiled and nodded. "Just checking that you are who you say you are."

"And have I convinced you?"

"Oh I never doubted it," he told her quietly. "But it never hurts to make sure."

He stepped round her to face the Captain, his tone taking on a more businesslike manner. "So then, Captain Kyon, why are you out here alone? Where's the rest of your squad?"

"We got split up," the Captain told them both as he slipped the safety catch back onto the rifle and slung the strap back over his shoulder, so it dangled by his side. "Something was following us, so I sent half the men to double back round and see what it was. Flank it and surround it, in case it was hostile. The rest of us carried on searching for the Governess."

"The 'rest of us'?" The Doctor didn't sound convinced. "So where are they now, then?"

"I don't know," the Captain admitted. "Something attacked us in the dark. We scattered to try and make ourselves harder targets for it to follow…..but then my horse bolted in a panic. Carted me off into the forest and I haven't seen or heard from anyone since."

"You communicate with them, how?" the Doctor asked as Aeryn slowly spun on the spot, the hairs on the back of her neck tingling suddenly.

"Doctor…." she hissed. But neither the Doctor or the Captain were listening, they were now talking about the Captain's communicator which he'd pulled out from his belt and the Doctor was examining with his shades.

"Doctor..." she spoke again a bit more forcefully this time, even as she held her hand back out, palm facing forward, casting her powers out into the darkness a second time.

Five seconds passed.

Ten seconds.

"Doctor!"

"Oh what is it Hoppity?" He sighed in frustration, turning to her. "Can't you see I'm busy?"

Her powers suddenly hit something, and burrowed deep, and all she could hear in her mind were three words, chanted over and over, in a rasping, deathly voice that elongated and drew out every 's' in a very serpent-like fashion.

"Find…..Kill…..Feasssssst…...Find…..Kill…...Feasssssst….."

And then she saw through the eyes of the creature, for the first time. A sea of cold, dark blue was broken by three glowing orange and red figures standing together in a group about three meters ahead, one short and feminine looking figure with her arm outstretched, the other two tall and masculine, huddled over some light blue piece of machinery. Bright red hearts pounded away in each of their chests, but the tallest figure of the group had two, and this was who the creature was focusing on, drawn by the temptation of the dual hearts.

Clenching her hand into a sudden fist, she snatched her powers back sharply, grabbed the branch that the Doctor had provided for her to use as a cane, and swung it round as she turned in a wide arc. From behind her a dark shadow exploded through the bushes, and as she came round in a complete circle, hoping and praying that she'd judged the distance right, the end of the branch made contact with the side of the creature's head, knocking it away from it's intended target – the Doctor.

"Nice one Hoppity!" The Doctor cried in both surprise and delight, as he ran forward and turned, showing his back to her and making a strange flapping motion with his hands. "Now up you jump! No way you're running away from this one without a little help."

She didn't need telling twice, and as the sound of gunfire erupted, lighting up the whole area with vibrant bursts of orange and white, Aeryn leapt onto the Doctor's back and clung on tightly round his neck, dropping the branch back to the floor so she could hold on with both hands.

"Get her out of here, Doctor! Take my horse, I left him a quarter mile to the south!" Captain Kyon barked as he kept a steady spray of gunfire aimed in the beast's general direction. But it was fast. Faster than him, and he couldn't keep up. All he could do was try to keep it at bay long enough for them to get the hell out of there.

"Now, Doctor! Move! That's an orde-" He was cut off suddenly as the creature reared up in front of him, there was a sound that could only be described as something from the very pits of Hell itself, and then the Captain screamed, and the dark shadow descended upon him.

The Doctor took off as fast as his long legs could carry him, heading south as the Captain had suggested in order to find the horse, and Aeryn ducked her head into his shoulder, holding on tight.

She did risk one quick glance back over her shoulder, however, and was sure she could just about make out the massive form of a snake, weaving it's body slowly round Captain Kyon, though in the enveloping darkness it was impossible to tell. His screams echoed after them into the night, and horrified by what she'd seen, she buried her head back into the Doctor's shoulder and tried to hold back the terrified sobs.

Not long after, they came upon Captain Kyon's horse, tethered to a tree but clearly terrified as he continually reared up and kicked out, straining at the tether in his eagerness to escape.

Aeryn slid down and stood back as the Doctor made gentle shushing motions to the terrified creature. Surprisingly it worked, and pretty soon he had the stallion untethered, leaping onto his back and then extending his arm to her. She swung up behind him and they set off again, back towards the castle in the distance.


	4. Flashcards

The Governor and an armed contingent of men were waiting for their return by the drawbridge of the castle, and as soon as the horse cantered over the wooden bridge, the armed men closed in behind them, guns trained back out into the darkness as they formed rank and ushered them back inside. Once everyone was in, the drawbridge was pulled back up and the portcullis dropped down, cutting off the only entrance into and out of the castle and securing it safely closed. But, for added security, a forcefield was then activated, and the entire castle was encased in a bubble of rippling, crackling blue energy.

Sliding carefully from the saddle into the Governor's waiting arms, Aeryn staggered unsteadily, but was quickly propped up again by her father, who was beside himself with worry. He fussed over her for several moments before she finally found her voice again and told him to leave her alone, much to the Doctor's amusement, after which she was smothered in a huge hug instead.

"Dad!" She snapped at last. "Will you listen to me? I'm fine! Nothing a quick bath won't fix! But you've got to sound an evacuation. Get everyone into the castle. Now!"

"What's going on?" the Governor frowned, though he was looking past Aeryn now, to the Doctor. Apparently having decided that the Doctor hadn't kidnapped his daughter at all, the Governor was now viewing him as her saviour, though he had yet to say as much. Knowing her father though, if the Doctor was waiting for a thank you, he'd have a very, very long wait. Her father wasn't the gratuitous kind, after all.

"There's a monster out there," the Doctor informed him now, standing proudly with his hands behind his back. "And I think you should do as your daughter says. IF anyone is still alive out there, bring them here. Will make it easier to keep a track of them. And hope that none of them are in fact the killer creature. Because that would be a little embarrassing."

"A monster?" Her father spluttered, unsure whether to laugh at the absurdity of it, in case this was all some big stupid joke, or actually take the Doctor and his word seriously.

"It's true, Dad," Aeryn told him quietly. "I saw it. It….it killed Captain Kyon."

The Governor gave her a sympathetic look, then kissed her on the forehead before wiping away the blood from her split lip with the pad of his thumb. "I'm sorry my love. Why don't you go and get yourself rested and recuperated, and I'll talk to the Doctor about what we can do?"

"Play nice," she warned with a hint of a smile, as she limped off, aided by Corporal Dale, a junior officer of her father's army. As soon as she was gone, the Governor walked over to the Doctor, looked him square in the eye, then puffed out his chest imperiously.

"I don't know what sort of game you're trying to play, Doctor, running off with my daughter and filling her head with delusions of monsters, but it stops now. Do you understand me? In the morning, I'm sending out a search team to round up Kyon and the rest of the cavalry, and I'll get the truth from them about what went on out there tonight. I've heard all about you from Kye and Darl so I know you're a trouble maker. I'm not stupid - "

The Doctor made a muffled snorting noise of amusement.

"You think that's funny?!" The Governor bristled.

"I think it's very funny. Because I think you're very stupid. But don't let me stop you. Carry on."

"How dare you! I want you out of here by morning, do you hear me?! You pack your things and you leave! And if I find out you've been within a hundred feet of my daughter, I'll kill you myself. Do I make myself clear?"

The Doctor wanted to argue back, but a voice in his mind chose that moment to speak up then. A very familiar voice, that belonged to a certain young woman.

A voice that sent a searing stab of pain through both hearts.

 _"Doctor,"_ Clara warned him. _"You're a better man than he is. Don't let his stupidity stop you. Use the cards if you're really struggling, but don't give in to the likes of him."_

The Governor huffed impatiently, clearly expecting an answer, but the Doctor held up one finger in the silent command to wait, whilst he dug in his pockets and pulled out the prompt cards that Clara had made for him, so, so long ago. Or so it felt.

He flicked through them for a moment, before coming across two possible ones he could use.

"It's at times like this, I could really use you, Clara," he grumbled quietly, before finally stuffing the rest back into his pocket and holding the two cards out to the Governor, raising his other hand over his eyes, much like some magicians did to prove they weren't peeping when asking an audience member to do something.

"Pick a card," he told him.

The Governor scowled. "This is no time for games, Doctor!"

"Fine, fine!" The Doctor snapped, turning to one of the nearby soldiers and holding the cards out to him in the same manner. "Pick a card."

Uncertain what was going on, the soldier did as he was told and pulled one of the cards from the Doctor's hand. The Doctor shoved the other card back into his pocket with the rest, took the chosen card from the soldier and read it out loud.

"I could be wrong. Let's try it your way."

"Is this some sort of joke?!" The Governor roared, and the Doctor frowned.

"Well I was leaning towards using the other card, but it's too late now. It's his fault." He pointed an accusing finger at the soldier. The Governor looked fit to explode then, so the Doctor sighed.

"I'll go and pack my stuff, shall I?"

"That would be a very good idea, sir!"

So with the Governor's eyes burning into the back of his head, the Doctor dug his hands into his pockets and made to go back in the direction of the guest bedrooms, where he'd been offered a place to stay only a few hours earlier, under the pretence of gathering his so called belongings. But of course he had no stuff to pack. It was all in the TARDIS, which was still where he'd left it, out in the middle of the woods. And there was no way he was going back out there without some sort of idea about what it was that he was actually facing. He might be an idiot with a box, but he wasn't stupid.

Which was when the idea came to him, and he took a detour up to the Royal Wing, hoping his hunch was right.

* * *

There were plenty of women in the Castle, though they were all servants, soldiers and maids. Aeryn was the only woman of status, and that was only because she was the Governor's daughter. Not to mention Governess herself – her status ranking her as equal to her father, despite being his daughter.

This meant that she had her own private quarter in the Royal Wing, complete with her own bathroom that was long and wide, with four large stone-lipped tubs sunk into the floor, each large enough for four or five grown men to drown in simultaneously. Then there were six bathroom stalls, five shower stalls, marble flooring and a row of sinks along one wall. The fact there was more than one of everything stemmed from the time of her ancestors – or her adoptive ancestors at least – who had had several daughters and women of nobility living in the castle at one time, and who would all have shared this bathroom together.

Aeryn was the only one who ever used this room now though, but it was always warm and steamy, and the tubs were always full and bubbling never-the-less.

Too exhausted by the pain she was in now that the adrenaline had worn off, added to the fact that she'd been awake for thirty two hours straight by this point, Aeryn couldn't really bring herself to care about anything else right then. She flicked on the terminal just inside the door, chose a playlist at random, pressed play and turned the volume up as high as it would go.

Then, as an ensemble of various different types of music blasted through the entire room, she lowered herself into the tub furthest from the door, still fully clothed. Only once she was submerged up to her neck in the cloudy not-really-water did she begin to very gingerly peel off the layers of dirtied clothing and dump them in a soggy, tangled heap as far from the tub as she could throw them. The only clothes she kept on were her underwear, determined to preserve at least some dignity, should anyone barge in as they often had a habit of doing, despite the fact this was the one place that was out of bounds to everyone – including her father. Mind you if anyone burst in now, they'd have a very pained, and by extension now very angry, Governess on their case, so only a fool would really even take such a chance.

Aeryn inhaled sharply as her shoulder flared in pain – when had that started to hurt?! She couldn't even remember, though there had been plenty of opportunities recently for her to have knocked it, or cracked the collar bone, or maybe even dislocated it. No, she'd have known straight away if it was dislocated. Still, she was rewarded with a strong whiff of the water she was now submerged in, as the pain died down again.

The water was strange, smelt like minerals and had a flat tang – a bit like waxen oranges. It didn't feel like regular water either, yet Aeryn still hadn't found out exactly what it was in the tubs. Whatever it was, it was jelly-thick and for a few seconds after touching bare skin it was so hot it stung. Then it would coat the skin completely, and the bubbles would turn sheer instead of translucent. Time spent in the tubs rapidly increased the body's natural healing process like crazy. It could mend broken bones in half an hour, prevent bruises from ever forming and reduce gashes and wide open wounds to mere scratches in less than ten minutes.

Sitting on the stone bench that ran round the edge of the tub, Aeryn cupped some of the heavy not-really-water in her palms, closed her eyes and smoothed it over her face. It crackled, soothing heat working its way past the ache of a sneakily developing black eye. Again, not really knowing how or when she'd even been hit in the face hard enough for a black eye to have started forming, and deciding at that moment that she didn't really care either, she sighed and laid her head back against the edge of the tub for a moment, relaxing in the warmth.

Relax. Something she very rarely got to do these days.

Realising rather belatedly however that her exhaustion was now starting to catch up to her and she was drifting off, she forced herself awake again sharply, eyes flying open and the mineral water crackling, falling away in little shards of white - the product of whatever the liquid actually was, reacting with the air. Wet hair hung in strings down past her shoulders, though all her braids had fallen out by now and she was left with just dark, wet hair crackling with the weird crystals of the not-water.

Her hip surged in another flare of pain, as though to remind her that it was still not completely sorted, so sitting up a little and moving to the edge of the bench, she watched as the not-water fizzed around her, heat burrowing in through her muscles, soothing and healing. Every now and then her hip would crackle as the bone knitted itself back together, sealing over the crack and repairing it so that it would be good as new by the time she was finished.

Taking one deep, long drag of the steamy air, she once again closed her eyes and pushed herself off the edge of the bench, into the centre of the tub. There, it was so deep that even standing on tip-toes her head didn't break the surface.

She remained hidden under the surface for what felt like an eternity, not really thinking about anything in particular...just trying to take her mind off the pain of her most recent wounds. And the even bigger pain – namely the Doctor – who had been the cause of 99% of them, albeit indirectly, in the first place.

The way he'd switched from raging fury one moment, to excited 'kid on Christmas morning' the next. The way he'd been so dead set on bringing justice to those hunters for the weasel cull, but had quickly backed down when she'd used her powers against him to show him a ghost from his past. And the way he'd then come to her, trusting her above anyone else to help him save a kingdom that he didn't even live in, had no responsibility for, and was just passing through on his travels.

Her lungs burned, reminding her that time was not on her side right now. Her head, shoulders and hip gave one last heave of pain each, then subsided, and she surfaced in a rushing splash, grabbing for the stone bench once more and pulling herself back to sit on it.

The not-water dribbled away from her hair, slicked her face, crackled as it hit open air, and instantly formed a weird, wax-white coating over every inch of exposed skin. She groaned, knowing it would take at least ten minutes in the shower to wash it from her hair, then very carefully stood on the stone ledge and stepped out of the bath. At least she'd regained the use of her leg properly now – her hip no longer felt broken or cracked, just bruised, and a large purple patch on her shoulder would be the only reminder of whatever she'd done, most likely when she'd been out in the woods with the Doctor.

Raising a hand and probing her lip carefully with one finger, she was relieved to find that it was no longer split and was only ever so slightly sore. Her black eye had vanished, too, before it had ever really properly formed, so that was also a bonus.

Over all, she was now feeling pretty good about herself as she stepped out of the bath, despite standing in the middle of a huge open room in only her underwear, with no dry clothes to change into, and the weird wax stuff coating every inch of exposed skin.

It didn't take long for this feeling to wear off, however, as after showering to get herself clean of the not-water, she opened the large oak wardrobe beside the door, only to find that she'd stupidly forgotten to stash some more clothes in there after her last trip to the baths.

Groaning at herself in frustration, she rinsed her old clothes under the tap to get them as clean of the waxy stuff and dirt as possible, then wrung them out and slipped back into everything except the white linen shirt she'd been wearing, because that was completely see through, and despite the fact she was wearing a black vest underneath, she just didn't see the need. So instead she settled for just the vest, leaving her bruised shoulder exposed and wishing that she'd brought her jacket, or even her cloak with her for an extra layer of warmth. Hopefully she'd have time to go back to her room and change into something dry before she was called upon again.

Though somehow, she very much doubted it. As was proven moments later when she walked from the room, and almost walked straight into the Doctor.

"There you are, Hoppity!" He smiled in delight as he picked up the towel which she'd been using to dry her hair, but had dropped in surprise when she'd very nearly collided with him. He then draped it back round her shoulders like a blanket, though she was expecting him to have thrown it over her head – and the look he was wearing told her that he'd been sorely tempted to in fact do just that. "I need your help."

"Seriously?!" she groaned, motioning to her soaked appearance. "Can't I have a few minutes to get sorted?"

"No time," the Doctor shook his head. "Some thing's a lurkin' out there, and your father thinks I'm making it up. He also warned me to stay away from you, but I don't usually tend to listen to things I disagree with, so here I am."

"You have a problem with authority?" She smirked, pulling the towel tighter about herself as she started to shiver.

"When I'm in the room, I AM the authority," the Doctor told her matter-of-factly. Then he looked all about, as though expecting to see something. "Do you have a library?"

"Of course."

"Good. That's - why are you all wet? Did you have an argument with a puddle?"

"I've just had a bath."

"...In your clothes?"

"Why not?"

He considered this for a moment as they started off towards the library. And then he shrugged.


	5. The Library

"Any luck?" Aeryn asked as the Doctor slammed a massive stack of rather old, dusty leather bound books on the table beside her.

"There's too many options!" He cried in frustration, throwing his hands into the air. "I need to know more. I need more information!"

"Isn't that why we're here?" She asked, pushing aside the book she'd been leafing through, in favor of the top one from the new pile he'd just produced.

"Yes, but I need more information to be able to find more information!" He huffed as he pulled out a chair and sat down as well, dragging another book towards him, flipping the pages rapidly and then discarding the book to one side in favor of the next one.

"Have you tried the 'mysterious alien' section?" She smirked.

"You have one of those?" Seeing her look, he shook his head. "That was a joke, wasn't it."

"Yeah. Was my quota of fun to alleviate the boredom of finding nothing for the past who knows how long," she nodded, standing up and stretching. She might have fixed her body in the bath, but sitting in a chair for several hours straight had caused her muscles to tense up. And not only that, but the library wasn't exactly the warmest room in the castle – it was actually quite drafty and her clothes were still damp, so she was getting cold again.

Walking over to the fire, she typed a combination into the keypad on the mantle and flames erupted up through the mound of logs. Adjusting their intensity a bit, she held her hands out to warm them, then rubbed her arms for a moment to try and encourage some heat back into them.

The Doctor watched her curiously as she finally came back over to join him again. "When did you stop limping? And why is your face not broken any more?"

"I've had this condition my whole life, remember? Well…..not quite, but almost my entire life..." She sat back down and pulled another book towards her. "You really think my father would have gone almost two whole millenia without finding some way to cure me each time I got into a scrape?"

"And what is this miracle cure?"

"No idea," she admitted. "Some sort of mineral water. It works, though. So I've never thought to question it. Looking a gift horse in the mouth, and all that."

"But you're not limping," he pouted.

"That was the idea of me having that bath, yeah."

"But what am I going to call you now? I can't call you Hoppity any more because you're not….well. You're not all hoppity any more."

"You could always call me Aeryn? Seeing as that's my name."

"Is it?" He frowned. "Did I know that?"

"You've already told me you don't listen to authority, so I wasn't expecting you to have remembered," she retorted, but not in an unfriendly or unkind way. She was more amused, than anything.

"So your name's Aeryn…?"

"Storm."

"Storm?"

"Yes."

He nodded, then pulled another book from the pile and frowned at it. It was a copy of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. "Why is this here?"

Aeryn glanced up from the copy of Naturalis Historia that she'd been leafing through. "Oh, I wondered where I'd left that!"

The Doctor was holding the book at arm's length as though it had a terrible smell, or had offended him in some way. "You like reading this nonsense?"

"They're good books!" She retorted defensively.

"A stone that can make you immortal? A flying car? A hidden platform inside a wall? Pfft, rubbish!"

"Says the man who's got a spaceship that's bigger on the inside!" Aeryn retorted once more, though in a less defensive manner this time, and more of a playful one instead.

"How do you know what my TARDIS is like?" Now it was the Doctor's turn to get defensive.

"Told you, this isn't the first time I've met you," Aeryn shrugged. "You and -" She hesitated, then changed what she'd been about to say, so as to avoid causing him any more unnecessary pain at the mention of Clara. "- your TARDIS gatecrashed my twelve hundred and twelfth birthday, remember?"

"That's just the thing. I DON'T remember," the Doctor frowned, pulling out his sonic shades and starting to scan her up and down. "Why don't I remember?"

"Well you're not exactly young, are you?" She grinned cheekily up at him. "Maybe you're getting a bit forgetful in your old age?"

"In MY old age?" He snapped, offended, as he pulled the glasses off again and tucked them back into his pocket once more. "How old are you now, exactly?"

"Two thousand and twenty four, give or take. I sort of lost count of a few years along the way."

"So you're definitely alien then," the Doctor nodded, as though this had confirmed something that had been playing on his mind for some time now.

"So are you, Time Lord."

"Again I have to ask...how do you know I'm a Time Lord?"

"I've seen inside your mind. Give me credit Doctor, I know more about you than a lot of people, but I do have a reason why."

"So you know that I'm a Time Lord, but what are you? What race? What species?"

"I'm a Caerleon."

"A Caerleon?" He repeated thoughtfully. And his face relaxed as he mulled it over, because this explained so much! Her mind powers, her ability to change her form, her agelessness...all traits of the Caerleon race of human-like aliens from the planet of the same name.

"So I'm told, anyway," she nodded. "I don't remember my home planet though. Was only a month old when my father took me, packed the two of us into a refugee shuttle with a load of other Caerleons and left. We went to Earth first, then he, Maric and I came here when I was twenty two. Maric and Dad in particular were finding it hard to hide the fact that they never aged in comparison to the humans, so we left and came here instead. These humans are a lot more tolerant of our differences, it would seem."

"Do you know why you left Caerleon?" The Doctor asked quietly.

"Dad's never said, and to be honest I've never asked. All I know is Mum's still there. She didn't come with us, but again I don't know why. Something to do with an elderly grandparent who's quite ill, I think. I'm sure she'll rejoin us one day though. When she's able."

The Doctor's face fell, and he looked away, but not before Aeryn had noticed the look in his eye.

"Doctor? What is it?"

"Nothing," he shook his head.

"No, there's something. What is it? What's happened?"

"Who's Maric?" he spoke suddenly, turning to look back at her in confusion.

"Don't avoid my question."

"Don't avoid mine," he retorted.

This time it was Aeryn's turn to look away. "I don't want to talk about him."

"Why not?"

"Because I don't."

"Everyone has a reason. Saying that you don't want to is just another way of avoiding the truth."

Aeryn stood up so sharply that her chair tipped over backwards. "Let's just call him my Clara!"

The Doctor's face dropped, and he nodded. "Point taken."

Aeryn paced away a few steps, took a deep breath then turned and walked back, visibly forcing herself to calm as she bent down and picked up the chair, setting it upright again. "So, what's happened to Caerleon?"

The Doctor looked to her with sad eyes and shook his head. Should he tell her? Somehow he felt like he had to. Like he had a duty to tell her the truth. "It was destroyed."

She stopped breathing momentarily, and her heart skipped several beats. "H….how?" She whispered eventually once she'd found her voice again, her knuckles turning white as she gripped the back of the chair.

"A meteorite struck one of the gas mines. Set off a chain reaction that went right to the core. I'm sorry."

Aeryn turned away back to the fire, and turned the flames up a little. It had suddenly grown a lot colder, all of a sudden. Or was that just her?

"H….how long ago?"

"In your timeline? About four hundred years."

She nodded, still with her back to him so that he couldn't read her emotions. "I think….I think I somehow knew."

"Caerleons form close bonds with their parents from birth. If anything had happened to your mother then yes, you would have felt it. Your father too. Such a devastation as that would have been felt by every Caerleon right across the galaxy."

She stood with her back to him for a moment longer, then turned and walked back to sit at the table again, her cheeks wet with silent tears.

"So," she palmed away the tears and forced her voice to become bright once more, which was a tough feat, but she somehow managed it. Just. "Here we are – two aliens – fighting to save a planet that's not our own. Funny how the universe works, isn't it?"

"It's never a bad thing," the Doctor smiled after careful consideration, sensing her need to change the subject, and respectfully going along with it. "So long as you're careful. I'm less breakable than humans, but you're not. Don't make the mistake of trying to be like me."

"No-one could ever be like you, Doctor. You're one of a kind." She sighed as she stood up once more and placed a hand on his shoulder, giving it a gentle squeeze. "And I've managed to keep myself alive this long...even though it's been bloody tough. So don't worry about me. I'll endure."

"Enduring is not the same as living," he pointed out, turning to watch her as she moved back into the rows upon rows of books that made up this particular section of the library. And in that moment, he saw something he'd never seen in her before.

A sadness – a great pain much like the terrible one he felt at the mention of a certain person – a pain that wasn't physical. Her physical wounds may have been healed by the miracle bath, but that had only uncovered her emotional pains and scars. Until then, they'd been hidden by the physical problems. Now they were exposed for the whole world to see, and she was struggling to hide them. But it wasn't the recent discovery of her mother's fate that had upset her. No, she'd been upset long before then. This grief was old – hundreds of years old in fact. The Doctor, a master on bearing grief for such a long period of time himself, saw the signs and knew. She'd been dealing with this grief for a very long time. Perhaps even centuries. And that explained her pale, sickly appearance.

Caerleons were well known for wearing their hearts on their sleeves. Their outward appearance mirrored their inner emotions. And Aeryn Storm was looking every bit how he himself was currently feeling over the loss of Clara. She was mourning. But not over her mother.

She'd called this Maric her 'Clara'. She was smart, so she'd have worked out by now that Clara had died. Did that mean that whoever Maric was, she'd been close to him and he'd suffered a similar fate? And he'd noticed a small tattoo on her left ring finger. A small symbol that was hard to make out without making a point of staring, but was there never-the-less.

Considering the significance of the finger the tattoo was on, and remembering the customs of the Caerleons concerning marriage and engagements, he had a pretty good idea of who Maric might have been. Which only made it even more tragic that he was gone.

As she came back with another mound of books, he sat back in his chair and gave her a gentle, steady look. "Tell me," he started. "How long ago did you lo-"

The deafening clash of a bell drowned out the rest of what he had said, and both he and Aeryn threw their hands over their ears as the entire room shook and trembled under the vibrations of the tolling.

It sounded three, four, five times. Then there was a pause, and then it struck again, another five times.

During the second pause, Aeryn shouted to him, "That's the warning bell! Something must have happe-" This time it was she who was cut off by the tolling of the bell, but the Doctor had caught the gist of what she'd been telling him, and nodded to the doorway at the far end of the library, his hands still clamped over his ears.

She didn't need telling twice and the pair of them scurried from the room as quickly as they could, not stopping until they were finally back in a part of the castle that was far enough away from the bells that they could talk without having to shout, and no longer needed to protect their ears.

"I swear whoever decided to put the bell tower above the bloody library was having a BRAINSTORM that day!" Aeryn gasped, shaking her head and probing her ears gently, convinced that she'd find blood, but relieved when she didn't.

"You said it was the warning bell?" The Doctor asked, pulling a strange face, like someone might do when trying to make their ears pop.

"Yeah," Aeryn walked over to the nearby window, doing her best to ignore the ringing in her ears and peered out, watching as down below, hundreds of terrified people fled across the drawbridge and into the castle. "Seems like my father's finally called for an emergency evacuation. He's pulling everyone into the citadel."

"The sun's come up at last," the Doctor noted as he looked over her shoulder. "If your father kept true to his word, he'll have found Kyon and his men by now."

"Or what's left of them," Aeryn shivered, remembering back to the attack they'd barely survived, out in the woods. "We should help."

"We should," the Doctor agreed. "But your father warned me away from you. You think it wise to cross him now?"

"He warned you away from me because he thought you were insane and creating stories of mythical beings. Some thing's changed his mind since. Maybe now, he'll start listening to you?"

"I don't call myself a Doctor for nothing," the Doctor smiled proudly then. "After you, Milady Governess."

"Still can't call me by my name, huh?" She smirked.

"No, I'm sorry, but it's no good. I'm trying, really I am, but it's just not sticking."

"Just call me Hoppity, then."

"But you're not hopping any more! It's a contradiction, and I hate those!"

She rolled her eyes and started towards the main hall of the castle, which she knew would be where the bulk of the people would be herded, specifically if any were hurt or in need of more urgent help.


	6. Love is a Promise

Aeryn knew she was a complete mess, with her straggly hair, red rimmed, bloodshot eyes, creased and still damp clothing and the definitive slouch of exhaustion weighing her down. But she didn't care. As the doors to the hall were thrown open and she and the Doctor stepped in to a sea of madness and hundreds of voices all calling out, crying to be heard over the tops of each other, she knew then that no matter how bad she might have had it up until now, it was nothing compared to what these poor people were going through.

It was no secret that Aeryn and her father were not human – everyone in the kingdom knew it, and everyone accepted it, but only because for the most part the two of them acted human enough for people to overlook the fact that they weren't.

Now, with her disheveled appearance and obvious exhaustion from being awake for nearly two days straight, Aeryn was looking more human than she'd ever done before. She wasn't the 'super perfect, not a hair out of place, not looking a day over twenty five' alien from another planet. She wasn't even the smart and proper 'Governess'. She was just herself, and that made the people warm to her even more.

It meant she was more approachable. She didn't intimidate people like her father was doing as he tried to bark orders and get some sort of sense out of the chaos all around him. When he snapped and shouted, people flinched and backed away. When Aeryn offered a tired smile, or a gentle word of encouragement, it was warmly appreciated, and returned in kind.

"Corporal Dale," she nodded as the young man who'd escorted her out of the courtyard earlier, squeezed through the throngs of people to stand before her. He snapped off a formal salute to her and the Doctor – who pulled a disgusted face at such an action. "Ma'am. Sir."

"What's the situation?" She asked, concerned as she looked at the sheer volume of people trying to cram themselves into the room. Most were walking wounded, but one or two were more badly hurt and required medical treatment by the Castle's physicians, who were already doing everything they could to help those in need. "What's happened?"

"Kiro was hit by something at dawn," the Corporal told them both. "We don't know what, but the survivors are saying it was something huge and black, that moved with speed unlike anything they'd ever seen before. It killed half the village, then collapsed the church where the remainder of the folks were hiding. After that it moved onto Chen and Bree. Same stories there. Huge, black creature, moving too fast for anyone to make out what it was, killed at least half the population of each place, and caused major structural damage during its rampage. After the first few survivors staggered up to the Castle, your father was finally convinced to sound the alarm. We've been evacuating each and every town and village since, bringing as many here as possible. Though if I'm being honest Ma'am, I don't think the castle will be big enough for all of them."

"Then make it big enough," Aeryn told him firmly. "We do not leave one single person outside the forcefield. Is that understood? We save everyone we can, and we don't stop. Not until the very last person is safe within these walls."

"Yes Ma'am," he saluted again, before turning away to carry out her instructions.

"Good call," the Doctor told her quietly as he moved along by her side. "At least this will be one less thing to worry about, with that creature still out there."

Aeryn opened her mouth to reply, but her father's harsh barking caught her attention and she turned in his direction to see her father reprimanding a young boy – no older than five at most – for making childish whimpering noises.

"You must be brave, boy! Stop that racket, you're embarrassing yourself!"

"Father!" Aeryn warned sharply as she stormed over. "Can't you see he's terrified? And you're not helping!"

Turning her back on her father, she knelt down in front of the terrified boy, so that she was on the same eye level as him, and not towering above him. Then she smiled. "Hello."

He whimpered and looked all around, and his bottom lip quivered as he fought to hold back his tears.

"I'm Aeryn," she continued gently. "What's your name?"

"Dion," he whispered.

"Hi Dion," she smiled again, her voice so gentle and calming that it was already having an influence upon him. He no longer looked like he wanted to run away, now. But he was still clearly terrified. She pointed to the strange alien creature he had on his pyjama top. "Who's that?"

"The….the snuffleootoopus…." Dion sniffed loudly, wiping his nose on his sleeve.

"The Snuffleootoopus?" Aeryn asked, blinking in surprise. "I've not heard of one of those before. Is he a goodie or a baddie?"

"He's a hero," Dion sniffed again. "He goes whoosh through the skies, saving people and...and saying 'Snuffloooo! Snuffleee!'..."

Aeryn laughed, knowing full well that the little boy was making this all up, as five year olds so often do, creating vivid fantasy stories and characters in their minds. "He sounds amazing! I bet he's very cool. And do you know what? So are you."

"I...I am?" Dion sniffed again.

"Absolutely," Aeryn nodded, holding out her fist to him. He smiled then, and reached out his own tiny fist to give her a fist bump.

"Yo."

"Yo," she chuckled. Then she glanced up to the Doctor, who also crouched down. "Dion, this is my friend, the Doctor."

"Hi," Dion smiled more confidently now as he held out his fist, and the Doctor fist bumped it affectionately.

"Hello. You must be the one in charge around here?"

Dion giggled then, and it was such a heart warming, infectious sound that those nearby all turned to look, smiling as they temporarily forgot about their own problems.

"No silly," Dion grinned. "I'm only five!"

"What's wrong with that?" The Doctor asked, deadly serious. "I once went to a planet that was ruled by a toddler. He was prone to some terrible temper tantrums, mind you. My friend thought it was hilarious when I got tasked with putting His Royal Highness to bed. Not one of my finer moments, I'll admit. But he was a good lad...turned into a brilliant Emperor when he was older. I should really go back and pay him a visit sometime."

"I'm not the boss," Dion insisted, still giggling at the Doctor's strange words.

"Oh?" The Doctor feigned surprise. "Well that's a shame. So if you're not, then who is?"

"Ahem," the Governor, realising for the first time that the Doctor and his daughter were together, stepped forward to make his grievances heard when Aeryn snapped him a sharp look that warned him to back off. And the intensity of her gaze actually gave him pause. She turned back to Dion just in time to see him point at her.

"She is! She's the bestest and bravest, and I love her!"

"Whoa!" Aeryn exclaimed as all of a sudden she was nearly bowled over backwards by the flying five year old, who had launched himself into her arms and was now clinging round her neck in a huge hug, giggling into her ear. And then he whispered something and the Doctor noticed that for the first time since he'd met her, her pale cheeks had suddenly coloured bright pink.

"Noooo no no no, sweetie," she shook her head vehemently as he stepped back. Then she bopped him on the nose with one finger. "And don't you go spreading that round, either. Otherwise I might have to call in the TICKLE MONSTER!" She wiggled her fingers and Dion shrieked with more laughter, running into the arms of his mother, who'd been beside herself with worry until just a few moments ago when she'd pushed her way through the crowd and found that her son was safe with the Governess.

"Thank you, Milady! Thank you so much!" She exclaimed as Aeryn and the Doctor stood up again side by side.

"No problem," Aeryn smiled. "Are you all right? Anything I can do to help?"

"You've done more than enough already, Milady. Thank you!"

"Well, if there is anything, you just let me know," Aeryn nodded, before turning away. The Doctor followed after her and she continued to make her way through the crowds, completely ignoring her father as he raged after her about how she was treading on dangerous ground, and how the Doctor should be restrained and incarcerated in one of the dungeons. The fact that no-one was even making a move to carry out his orders, however, told the Doctor exactly where the real power in this kingdom lay. And it certainly wasn't with the Governor.

"What was that all about?" he asked eventually, when his curiosity finally got the better of him.

"Hmmm?" Aeryn had been distracted by another villager, checking that they were okay, and hadn't heard him. When he repeated himself, she shrugged.

"My Dad doesn't like you. Can't think why though." She smirked and the Doctor gave her a sarcastic smile in return.

"Oh Governess Storm, you are hilarious. I meant what Dion said to you. I saw the look on your face."

"Oh….that..." She blushed again, before clearing her throat and trying to act casual. "He just wanted to know if you were my boyfriend."

"Ah." The Doctor was the one to blush now. "Yes well, I can understand the confusion. Appearances can be deceiving."

Aeryn looked to him as if he'd just said the most stupid thing she'd ever heard. "No Doctor. No, no and no. Don't even try and go there."

"Go where?" He frowned, confused.

"Down that road. The one that says there's even the slightest possibility that you and I..." She motioned to the two of them, then shook her head again. "No offence, but just no."

"No offence taken," he shrugged. "You're not my type."

This surprised her. "You have a type?"

"Everyone has a type," he nodded. "Though mine really depends on my face."

"Depends on your…." She started, confused. Then she shook her head. "Never mind. I'm not sure I want to know."

"Besides, I'm married."

Again this surprised her. "You are?"

"Four times," he nodded, trying not to be offended.

"Is Clara one of your wives?"

She'd said it before thinking, and almost clapped a hand over her mouth in horror as her brain caught up to her mouth. Because there was that sad expression again, and she instantly regretted saying anything. She fully expected the Doctor to shut her down again, or shout at her, or get angry. All of which would be perfectly justified reactions. But he didn't.

"No. She and I were friends."

Was it her imagination, or was he looking like he wanted to tell her more, but had forced himself not to? So did she press him further? Should she make him talk about Clara, in the hope that it finally unburdened some of his grief and helped him to move on?

Oh hell, why not? What was the worst he could do? Aside from throw her to the deadly killer in the woods, of course.

"But you loved her?"

He paused a beat too long before he answered. "We were just good friends. That's all."

"Even friends can love each other," she told him quietly as they finally reached the door that would lead them back out of the hall again, and she opened it to let them both through. "Doesn't mean it has to be a romantic kind of love. Loving someone and being IN LOVE with someone are two very different things."

"Are they?" He didn't sound convinced, but he was at least giving some serious consideration to her words.

"Course it is. I love my Dad, but I was IN love with someone a long time ago and - NO Doctor! I do not want to talk about it!"

He snapped his mouth shut again, and she glared at him for a moment, just to make sure he really wasn't going to press that particular line of inquiry further. Then she continued on. "Anyway, what I'm trying to say is, don't be ashamed to admit you loved Clara. Doesn't mean it was a romantic kind of love, but it also doesn't mean it had to mean anything less either. She was your best friend, yes? You'd have died for her, and….from the way you feel about her….from what I saw in your mind...I'm assuming she did the same for you. That's a unique kind of love that not many get to experience. So don't ever be ashamed of it. Embrace it. Be proud of it and be thankful for it. Because love isn't an emotion, it's a promise."

"Who told you that?" He asked quietly.

She reached up gently then and tapped the side of his head lightly. "Who do you think?"

The Doctor was strangely quiet for a long time after that.


	7. The Ability to Act

Following a quick detour to Aeryn's personal quarters so that she could get changed into something dry and more comfortable – namely dark jeans, a black t-shirt and a blue leather jacket with suitable leather boots this time instead of the stiletto heels she'd been wearing up until that point - the pair of them headed back to the library to see if they could find any more clues that could help them. But after what felt like hours of fruitless searching, they finally wandered out on to the balcony to get some fresh air and view the kingdom in the daylight for the first time.

"By the stars," Aeryn breathed as she took in the sight before her. The land was black. Literally. It was like a wave of death had rolled across the entire area beyond the forcefield and wiped out all life, leaving nothing but a charcoaled, poisonous ruin in it's wake.

"Doctor, what could have done this?"

"I don't know," he shook his head, just as stunned by what he was seeing as she was. Then he turned to her. "When we were out in the woods, you knew where it was going to attack from-"

"You're welcome, by the way."

"I'm being serious!"

"So am I!"

"How did you know it was there?"

"I saw inside it's mind." She wasn't looking at him, she was looking out across the landscape – or what was left of it – still horrified by what she was seeing, and struggling to believe it.

"It was weird. Most of the time I see memories. I hear people's thoughts and inner voices. But this thing? I dunno. It was like it was on a mission. It was only focussed on one thing, and one thing alone."

"Tell me everything you know. Leave nothing out."

"Uh…" She hesitated, thinking hard as she finally tore her gaze away from the devastation to look back at him instead. "It...started it's rampage yesterday evening?"

"Narrows it down," the Doctor nodded thoughtfully. Aeryn blinked, not really seeing the connection there, but carried on anyway.

"It's fast. I mean really fast. Like a 'blink and you'll miss it' kind of fast."

"Blink?" The Doctor repeated thoughtfully, latching onto that one particular word. "Weeping Angel? No, wrong profile," he dismissed the idea rapidly, then made a motion with his hands. "Keep it coming."

"Uh...people say it's black?"

"Narrows it down," he nodded again. And again she failed to see how, but decided that now was not the time to question him.

"It's toxic? It's poisoned the land. And judging from the silence, it's either killed or scared away everything else. There's no wildlife at all. Anywhere."

"Something so terrifying that everything flees before it? Narrows it down," he nodded, ticking it off on another finger.

She paced back and forth for a moment, trying to go back over everything again in her mind. Then she snapped her fingers suddenly, causing him to jump. "It sees in infra-red! When I read it's mind, I saw what it was seeing. A sea of blue with heat sources picked out in oranges and reds."

This answer seemed to please him. "Now we're getting somewhere!"

"And it kept repeating three words, over and over. Find. Kill. Feast."

"It's hungry?" the Doctor considered. "Must have one hell of an appetite then. Which rules out killing for sport….shame, that could have narrowed it right down."

"And it had a lisp!" She beamed triumphantly, figuring that this was an important point, only to now receive a confused look from the Doctor in return.

"Lot's of creatures have a lisp. That's no help at all!"

"No, no not a lisp as such, but more of a hiss. It elongated the 's' each time. Like when someone's mimicking a snake talking? You know they exaggerate the 's' sound?"

"Who mimics snakes?" The Doctor clearly thought she was mad, but she didn't care. Because as far as she was concerned, it was a very important thing.

"Doctor, I think our killer's a snake. A bloody big one, in fact!" She shuddered at the sudden memory of last night, when Captain Kyon was attacked. She could have sworn she saw something coiling it's way round him and constricting him. The thought of what would have come next was a terrifying one and all of a sudden she found that she'd broken out into a cold sweat.

"Some snakes see in infra-red," the Doctor nodded, oblivious. "Not a bad theory. And it started killing after the hunters returned from – what was it they were doing again?"

"It was a weasel cull."

The Doctor didn't seem impressed, so she decided to explain.

"Their numbers have quadrupled in the last year."

Nope, still not impressed. In fact she was digging herself an even deeper hole.

"They're vermin."

He might as well have just handed her a shovel! Because if it was even physically possible, his expression – and his eyebrows in particular - were growing more and more furious.

"They raid the chicken coops and rabbit dens!"

Definitely not a fan of the weasel cull then. Perhaps if someone could hand her a ladder to get herself out of this hole she'd now dug for herself, that would be great.

"Idiot," he muttered suddenly. Her eyebrows furrowed.

"Excuse me?"

"Idiot!" He exclaimed more loudly.

"Well same to you!"

"No, no, I'm not calling you an idiot. Not this time, anyway. I'M the idiot! All this time it was staring me right in the face, and I missed it! That's just….that's embarrassing! Let's pretend that never happened!"

"Doctor, what the hell are you talking about?"

"I know what's out there."

The way he said it with absolute and dead certainty sent a shiver down her spine.

"What is it?"

"The Chamber of Secrets has been opened, Hoppity."

She blinked. "Huh?" And then she realised that she was back to being Hoppity again. So much for him being furious with her. Not that she was complaining of course.

"The Chamber of Secrets?" He prompted when it became clear that she wasn't following. "Harry Potter? Oh come on, you've read it a hundred times! I saw the spine of that book! I'm amazed it's still holding itself together! Think! What's in the Chamber?"

Aeryn thought back to the fictional book for a moment, running back over everything that happened. And then she breathed a rather colourful exclamation.

"Indeed," the Doctor nodded. "I'd warn you to mind your language, but in this instance I'd say it was justified. Though if you try and tell me now that it's Lord Voldemort we're hunting, I'll hit you with my shoe."

Aeryn pointed out to the kingdom beyond, ignoring his attempt at a joke. "A...a basilisk? That thing...is a BASILISK?!"

"A basilisk," the Doctor confirmed grimly.

And again Aeryn swore, an even more colourful exclamation this time, if that was even possible as she started to pace in agitation. "Are you sure it's a basilisk, Doctor? I mean, are you really sure? It's not just some big snake?"

"I need to see it to be sure. Which could be a little tricky, considering."

"Considering?" She paused in her pacing and looked to him.

"Considering it's living, breathing, slithering death incarnate."

"So just a minor problem then," she replied sarcastically as she ran her hands through her hair, beginning to pace in agitation once more and working herself up into a panicked frenzy with every passing second. When she glanced in his direction and noticed that he didn't actually seem phased by what was going on, she paused again.

"Doctor…..there's a basilisk out there. A basilisk! You could at least try to look a little concerned!"

"I need to get to the TARDIS," he said thoughtfully, pulling out his sonic shades, slipping them on and scanning the horizon. "Which is about four miles in…..that direction." He pointed somewhere off to their right. "Four miles? I can do that. Just a walk in the park….with a basilisk on the loose." Now he had started pacing as well, waving his hands as he argued with himself.

"I can do four miles. Easy. Definitely. Sure. Ninety nine percent sure. Really? Ninety nine percent? That's quite high. Is that the figure you're sticking with? Okay, okay, seventy five. Well that's jumped quite a bit! You've just lost twenty four percent. And I swear we've had this argument before."

The sound of a door slamming behind him snapped him out of his lone argument with himself, and he turned to find that he was suddenly alone on the balcony. "Hoppity?"

Switching a setting on the sonic shades, he x-rayed the door to see through it, and sure enough Aeryn was storming off back down the corridor. Or at least her skeleton was, because that was all he could currently see. Rushing back inside after her, he jogged to catch her back up, the shades still in x-ray mode. And as he drew nearer, he saw something that he'd never have noticed before. Well of course he'd never have noticed, because he didn't make a habit of seeing people's skeletons normally, if he could help it.

Up and down her body were hairline cracks and fractures in her bones. Hundreds of them. Each of them an old wound, with the exception of her hip which was recent. They'd all healed as much as they were able, but it was like she was scarred internally. And the sheer volume of old wounds was enough to cause him some concern. Yes she was old, nearly as old as him in fact, and these wounds could have been spread out over centuries, but no wonder she was so fragile! It looked like someone had literally shattered her into a thousand pieces and then glued her back together again. No wonder she was so full of pain. And not just emotional pain, he realised.

His respect for her doubled right at that moment in time. Because he had the luxury of regeneration each time his body was too badly hurt or worn out. She didn't have that luxury. What happened to her was permanent. And no amount of miracle water would ever cure her completely. Yet she wore each mark as a badge of honour. Each one told a story, and she carried them proudly. Because they made her who she was. It was just such a damned shame!

Tugging the shades off and tucking them back into his pocket, he fell into step beside her.

"Finished arguing with yourself, now?" She huffed, not looking at him.

"It's surprisingly not as fun as it sounds," he replied.

"So, how are we going to stop this creature? Use a mirror on it like Perseus did to Medusa?"

"Perseus didn't use the mirror ON Medusa, he used it so that he could see her, which allowed him to get close enough without turning to stone. Only her direct gaze could kill. Not looking at her via reflection," the Doctor corrected. "And besides, this is completely different."

She shot him a look. "Is it?"

"And as for your original suggestion, turning a mirror on the basilisk wouldn't work. Otherwise it would have to avoid every reflective surface in the world, and that's not possible. How's it supposed to drink? Water's a natural mirror."

"Close it's eyes first?"

He wanted to argue that point, but found that he actually couldn't because it was quite valid, so he opted for changing the subject instead. "Naturalis Historia. Pliny the Elder. Daft as a brush, but brilliant where it counted! The David Attenborough of his day. Never play Monopoly with him, mind. He cheats something fierce."

"What about him?" Aeryn sighed, failing to see the point he was trying to make.

"He wrote that weasels are the bane of the basilisk. So all we need is a weasel and - Oh, wait, there's none left!" This was quite clearly a dig that she'd been expecting because she held up her hands in defence of the accusation.

"They suddenly started multiplying!"

"And now we know why! Nature's very own pop-up blocker and you lot took the firewall down! No wonder your hard drive's now infected."

Judging by the confused look Aeryn was now wearing, the Doctor realised that this had probably been lost in translation, so he sighed. "A basilisk egg is laid. It's close to hatching. Mother Nature doesn't want that to happen so the weasels – the only thing known to kill a basilisk – start to multiply in order to prevent it from leaving it's lair. The egg hatches, because nothing can stop that part from happening, but the creature won't come out whilst there's danger around. It stays underground and doesn't bother anyone. Eventually it will either be forced to come out in search of food, and the weasels will get to it first, or it will die of starvation in its lair. Either way it's a win/win for Mother Nature. But you lot – you blundering pudding brains come along, start shooting the weasels. All of a sudden there's nothing to stop the basilisk any more. You've just cleared it a pathway to the surface – taken all the bouncers from the doors and allowed it free entry to do what the hell it wants, unchecked and uncontrolled."

She was silent for a very long time after, and he was just about to ask whether she'd lost her voice completely, when she stopped walking and just stood in the middle of the corridor. It took him a moment to realise that she was no longer beside him, but when he did, he stopped as well and looked back to her.

"I'm sorry," she said so quietly, that it was almost lost in the echoing stonework of the vast corridor they'd now found themselves in. He wasn't entirely sure who she was saying sorry to, however. Him, herself, or the hundreds of people now crammed into every available space within the castle as they sought refuge.

"It's my fault," she spoke again, just as quietly. "I...I should have stopped my father. I knew it was wrong. I KNEW!" She turned and slammed a fist off the stonework of a nearby pillar, then yelped in pain, clutching her hand to her chest and letting out a growl of part anger, part agony, turning away from him. He stepped back towards her, unsure if he should comfort her or not, but then she started talking again and he paused, so that he could listen.

"I've never agreed with the hunting. I...I complain about the bloody activists, but actually they're right. It's cruel, and it's barbaric, and I should have stopped it! I should have made them find another way! Because what's a few chickens? A few eggs and a couple of dozen rabbits? Nothing, when you compare it to how many lives have now been lost. Because of me!"

"Don't blame yourself," he sighed, stepping round in front of her and taking her hand gently in his. It had already started to colour a violent shade of purple around her little finger and down the side, towards her wrist. Very definitely broken. Yet she didn't even flinch when he probed and examined it. If anything, she was the one now lost in her own anger and despair.

So, he decided to snap her out of it. Quite literally. By taking her little finger which had dislocated itself under the impact of meeting solid stone, and popping it back into it's socket.

"ARGH!" She yelled so loudly that it echoed all around them and even the Doctor flinched. And then they stood in silence for a long moment, before finally she pulled her hand back and cradled it close to her chest again, taking a few steadying breaths.

"You weren't to know," he was the first to break the silence.

"But I should have. As Governess, I have a duty of care towards this kingdom! And I've failed them! People are dead because of me..." She pulled herself up as tall as she could then, and her face transformed from one of pain and self loathing, to one of determination and utter conviction. "I had the ability to act. And that meant I had the responsibility to act."

"You have the ability to do something now," he smiled then, an encouraging smile, hoping that she'd take the hint. And to his relief, she didn't disappoint.

"Then I have the responsibility to put right my mess." She gritted her jaw in sheer bloody determination. "Tell me what to do Doctor."

And just like that, he found that she was back. The familiar Aeryn that he'd come to actually quite like, during the short time he'd known her.

Reaching into an inside pocket, he pulled out a small compact mirror, flipped it open and snapped it in two, handing half to her. "This is only a temporary solution until we get back to the TARDIS. Do not go round any corners without checking first. The basilisk's gaze is deadly, but only if it's direct. Reflected from a shiny surface should mute the potency."

"Mute...the potency?" She wasn't sure she wanted to know, but had to ask anyway.

"It probably won't kill you, but it might have a few nasty side effects. Still, better than being dead. Probably."

"You really know how to sell a situation, don't you," she sighed, tucking the mirror into the pocket of her jacket.

"You could always wait here," he suggested then as he made his way towards the stairway which would lead down into the main hall, and by extension, the courtyard beyond.

"I could," she agreed, falling into step beside him. "But you know I won't."

"How can you be so sure?"

She took the mirror back out. "You gave me this."

He grinned, glad that she'd worked it out for herself. She was starting to think again. Think quick and think smart. Only a good thing, considering what they were about to do.

"Though of course," she continued as they stepped outside. "You gave me this, assuming we'd be walking all the way to the TARDIS. There is another way."

He cast her a curious, sidelong glance, as she diverted towards what looked like a stable block. It was locked from the outside, and the lock had severely rusted from lack of use. Whatever was inside had been kept locked away for a very long time.

But Aeryn produced a key from the chain around her neck and unlocked the door, heaving it open and coughing slightly from the cloud of dust that billowed out.

Inside, there were no horses, thankfully. Just swirling dust motes that danced in the light filtering through the open doorway. And in the very centre of the otherwise empty room, there was just a large dust sheet covered mound. With a triumphant flourish, Aeryn whipped the sheet off, causing another cloud of dust to fly into the air, as the object beneath the sheet was revealed. It was a creation unlike anything the Doctor had ever seen before. Huge back wheels with grooves several inches deep provided the power to drive it across any terrain, whilst the front tyres – similar in grip but slightly smaller - would provide the steering and agility, and the armoured cab with built in roll cage and flexible suspension would protect it's occupants, no matter how harsh or bumpy the ride became.

At the back were two exhausts that the Doctor could quite literally have put his whole head in if he'd wanted, and he didn't even want to try and imagine what kind of engine powered this monster machine.

"Desert Thunder," Aeryn smiled proudly, opening one of the doors and motioning for the Doctor to step round to the other side. As they climbed in, the Doctor was amazed to find that inside, it was all luxuriously finished in leather and walnut and comfort of the highest extreme – a complete contrast to it's exterior. The dashboard was also an array of lights and symbols that could have given the TARDIS console a run for it's money.

"Maric built her from scratch. Only one of her kind in existence," Aeryn explained proudly as she ran a hand fondly over the walnut dash, then started the engine using a combination of buttons and switches. There was an almighty roar, and their whole surrounding began to shake and vibrate with the deep, guttural growls of the beast that had been awoken.

"You know how to drive this thing?" The Doctor asked nervously as he reached for the seat belt and fastened it tightly.

"Well I haven't driven her for a while. And my hand's gonna be a bit of a problem," Aeryn admitted as she very slowly eased them out of the garage. "But it should be fine. It should all come back to me. Just like riding a quadricycle, huh?"

"Hell of a time to decide to take the stabilisers off," the Doctor muttered.

"You'll love it. Trust me," Aeryn grinned back.

They eased towards the exit and Aeryn opened the door (as apparently the windows didn't open at all) so that she could have a quick conversation with some of the guards on duty. The Doctor didn't hear everything that was said because of the continuous rumblings of the vehicle – whatever it could be called. Some kind of dune buggy, perhaps? Or an all terrain armoured transport? He's just call it Dessert Thunder. Much simpler.

But above the 'purr' of the engine, he could just about make out the words "back up", "danger", "basilisk" and "keep everyone safe". From that he was able to pretty much work out the gist of what she'd been saying.

Once they crossed the drawbridge that had been lowered for them and passed through the small archway in the forcefield that had also been opened for them, Aeryn paused and put the handbrake on. Then she turned in her seat to see the forcefield closing again behind them and the drawbridge rising.

"Okay, we're on our own for now," she told him then. "They're not gonna send reinforcements until we say. Until then, they're guarding everyone in case the basilisk comes this way and tries to get in when we're gone. So...where are we going?"

The Doctor looked to the instrument display in front of him, and pointed to the blank screen. "This work?"

"That button there," Aeryn pointed. The Doctor flicked the screen on and was glad to see that it was just as he'd expected it to be – satellite navigation of the very advanced kind.

He quickly plotted the co-ordinates of where he expected the TARDIS to be and then nodded to Aeryn. "All set."

"Then let's go." With a cheeky grin in the Doctor's direction, Aeryn slammed her foot on the accelerator and they shot forward like a rocket, the immense beast of a machine eating up the ground with ease, roaring a triumphant cry as it was finally set free and allowed to stretch it's legs for the first time in decades.


	8. Bigger on the Inside

**Author Note: Just because I haven't done one for a while, here it is now. Thank you so much to everyone who's favorited this story, or added it to their alert lists - I'm glad it's to your liking because for a while I was worried that perhaps I'd made a mistake, going along this sort of story line. But now I'm hoping it wasn't a mistake, and I'm even debating whether I should write possibly a sequel after this? Well, a sequel for the Doctor, a prequel for Aeryn if that makes sense, considering she's already met him in her past. I might explore that meeting, where the roles are reversed and the Doctor knows Aeryn but she doesn't know him. What do you think? Good idea? Bad idea? Leave it as this one story?**

 **Thank you again for your continued support.**

* * *

The Doctor had loved the thrill of the joy ride, just as Aeryn had suspected he would, and was in considerably high spirits when they finally came to the clearing where the TARDIS was waiting for them.

Sliding to a rather graceful halt beside the time machine, Aeryn killed the engine, unbuckled her seat belt, then lent over and popped open a secret compartment in the dash. "Sorry, do you mind if I bring this?" She asked, pulling out a first aid kit.

The Doctor wasn't listening, he was already out and snapping his fingers, to which the TARDIS door obediently sprung open for him. So Aeryn brought the first aid kit with her anyway, and hesitantly walked towards the open doorway.

And then she stepped inside and gasped. "Doctor, it's…..it's..."

"Bigger on the inside," he finished knowingly, without ever breaking a stride as he walked up the ramp to the central console and began to work frantically at levers and dials. And then he paused and turned back to her, snapping his fingers again so that the door closed behind her.

"Hold on, you've seen inside my head, and this STILL surprises you?"

"I...thought you were exaggerating," Aeryn admitted sheepishly as she stepped further in, looking around in amazement.

The Doctor rolled his eyes, then turned back to the monitor to study some readings, effectively leaving Aeryn to get on and do her own thing. So after wandering around for a bit in awe, taking it all in and listening to the gentle humming of the ancient machinery, she finally went to the upper level and did a complete lap of it, scanning the books on the bookshelves and the various notes the Doctor had scribbled on his multitude of blackboards, stopping to study the sculpture of Beethoven for a moment and then looking out over the entire room, still not sure she quite believed what she was seeing.

She picked up the electric guitar that was leaning to one side, and curiously plucked a few strings. The entire room echoed with the sound, and the Doctor spun round sharply, pointing an accusing finger at her. "Don't touch anything!" He warned, as she quickly set the guitar back down again.

"Okay?!"

"Okay," she agreed, feeling like a naughty child who'd just been caught doing something she shouldn't.

"Okay?!" He asked again, his eyebrows narrowed as he glared at her.

"Okay," she repeated, holding her hands up to show they were empty and prove that she was doing as she was told.

Finally satisfied, the Doctor went back to whatever it was that he was doing, and she completed the lap of the upper level, arriving back at the top of the stairs where she'd first started, taking the first aid kit from where she'd left it on the swivel armchair and then sitting herself down in the chair. He hadn't told her she couldn't sit down, after all. Just not touch any of his strange and random objects and artifacts that were dotted around the room.

The chair was surprisingly a lot more plush and comfortable than it had first looked with it's high back and narrow arms, and she only now realised just how long she'd been on her feet for. Exhaustion allowed her to sag into the chair, and now that she was comfortable, she began to sort out her hand.

Popping the lid open, she was glad to see the small vial inside which contained some of the 'miracle' water that she often used to heal herself. Taking out some gauze padding, she soaked it in a little water from the vial, then held it over her hand for a bit, making sure to cover as much of the bruising down the side as possible. After a while, the pain turned into a dull throb instead and she took out a roll of bandage, rather awkwardly attempting to wrap it round the gauze to hold it in place.

By the time she'd finished, she looked like she was wearing a white finger-less glove that extended half way to her elbow, but at least it was supportive, held the gauze in place and was tight enough that it wouldn't come undone now. She could feel the water soothing and working it's magic already, so all in all, she was pretty satisfied with her handiwork, all things considered.

Realising the pun she'd also just inadvertently made, she chuckled to herself, swiveled the chair round so that she could see down to the console below, folded her legs up underneath her and watched the Doctor for a time. He seemed to know what he was doing, and was fairly engrossed in whatever it was, so she didn't want to disturb him.

At some point, however, the Doctor seemed to finally remember that he wasn't alone, because he turned in a circle, trying to spot her, before his eyes turned upward and he smiled, seeing her watching down on him keenly, and looking rather comfy and snug, curled up in the armchair.

"When was the last time you ate or slept?" He frowned, realising that he actually couldn't remember her do either in all the time he'd been with her.

"Same as you, probably," she shrugged.

"Well that won't do." He delved into a pocket of his jacket and retrieved a bright red apple, which he tossed up to her and she caught deftly, albeit with some surprise.

"Where the hell did that come from?"

"Time Lord pockets. Bigger on the inside. But you'd better have it because it was ruining the lining of my jacket," the Doctor shrugged, turning back to the monitor again. There was a loud crunch from the upper level, and he smiled to himself.

"So what exactly are you doing?" She asked after a moment, talking round a mouth full of apple.

"I am trying to find ways of getting rid of our serpent problem," he slapped the screen away in frustration and it swiveled half way round the console. "But short of dumping it in a black hole, there's nothing other than weasels that can stop it."

She took another bite of the apple, chewed it thoughtfully for a moment, then tilted her head to one side as she gazed down at him. "So why don't we do that, then?"

"Do what?" He rubbed his face tiredly with one hand, leaning back against the console for support.

"Dump it in a black hole, somewhere?"

"Oh yes, because it just so happens it's as easy as that!" He snarked sarcastically back.

"Was just trying to help," she scowled. "But fine, whatever." And with that, she uncurled one foot from beneath her, kicked the railing and swiveled the chair round so that the back was facing him.

"Very mature response," he retorted. But all he got in reply was loud and somewhat exaggerated crunching as she continued to eat the apple.

He half expected the core to be lobbed back over the chair to come sailing down and clonk him on the head when she was finished, but that was just childish. And Aeryn Storm might be a lot of things, but she wasn't childish. Most of the time.

He turned back to the console behind him again, and then actually considered her words for the first time. "It's as easy as that," he muttered quietly, repeating what he'd just said. And then he repeated it again, as the realisation slowly processed. "It's as easy as that! Hoppity, you genius! It's as easy as that!"

But she wasn't talking to him now. She was absorbed in some kind of silent tantrum, so he decided to just let her be, and began working on how they would carry out the plan to rid this planet of it's terrifying serpentine menace.

* * *

Two hours later, he knew what had to be done.

"You were right, Hoppity, it really was easy when I put my mind to it!" He called up to her triumphantly. Still, there was no answer.

"Alright look, if you're going to be petulant about it, would it help if I said it was a very good idea?"

Still no answer.

"I'm not liking this silence, young lady!" He affected his best fatherly tone then, marched up the stairs to confront her -

And stopped.

Because Aeryn was curled back up in the chair again, fast asleep, her breathing soft and slow. In the short time she'd been a part of his life, the Doctor had quickly learnt that it was rare to see her so quiet and still – she was usually a bundle of limitless energy, even when she was running on empty. When she wasn't talking, she was fidgeting - always keen to be doing something and not liking the idea of just standing around, waiting. She looked so peaceful and serene and still now - a complete contrast - that he suddenly lost the heart to wake her up, and instead turned and headed back downstairs again, only to return a short time later with a blanket, which he laid over her. She shifted a little and mumbled something unintelligible, frowning at whatever dream she appeared to be stuck in as it clearly took an unwelcome turn.

The Doctor was just debating whether or not to wake her, when she appeared to relax once more – the dream apparently passing.

Very carefully he took the apple core from her limp hand, noting that there was barely anything left of it other than a single skinny strip of core and a few seeds. Not only was she exhausted then, but starving as well. Yet she'd been willing to put aside her own needs for the sake of her kingdom and the people in it. She'd been pushing herself to keep going until it had become physically impossible for her to do any more. And even then she'd not given in by choice.

She'd proved she was brave, smart, loyal, compassionate and selfless already. But this was the final act that sealed the deal in his mind.

When this was all over, he'd offer her a key. It was about time he picked himself up and got back on the proverbial horse again, and suddenly he could think of no-one better to share the wonders of the world with, than Aeryn Storm.

She'd never replace Clara, of course. No-one ever would. But then she wasn't trying to, either. And possibly, just as she'd started to very slowly fix him, he might be able to do the same for her as well. Because now he could see the tattoo on her finger clearly. And he could see that it was the infinity symbol – the Caerleon equivalent of an engagement ring. After marriage, the symbol would be extended to each side with the pattern of choice of each individual, though usually the husband and wife would choose the same patterning as one another. Then when a first child was born, the two halves of the pattern would be joined together to complete the circle and unify the whole.

Aeryn's tattoo had never gone any further than the infinity symbol of her engagement. Now he was understanding her even more. And he knew now, for certain, who Maric had been, and why she was in a state of grief and mourning several centuries later. Because Caerleons, like so many species, paired for life. Aeryn had lost her life partner, and she would never find another.

No wonder she was so depressed.

Realising he was still holding the apple core in his hand, he turned on the spot once, then twice, then smiled as the idea came to him. He'd throw it out the door and maybe it'd take seed and become a blossoming apple tree. That would be nice. And then in the summer, if Aeryn ever wanted to come home for a few days, like his other friends had sometimes done so they could be with their families, then she could come out here to this spot and read her Harry Potter books, and remember fondly back to the time when….there was a killer snake on the loose and she blamed herself for it and hundreds of people died.

Huh, maybe that wasn't such a good idea then. Unless he could get rid of the basilisk and save the day. Be the hero he'd forgotten how to be. Be the man he'd made a promise to be, such a long time ago.

"You were right, Clara! I'm done being the warrior. Because I'm the Doctor," he announced proudly to the otherwise silent console room. "And I save people!"

And somewhere in his mind, a familiar voice whispered back. "Run, you clever boy..."

* * *

Aeryn lurched upright, gasping, staring blindly into the darkness, grasping the sides of the chair and crying out in fear.

She'd had many bad dreams during her lifetime. Ever since Maric had been killed in fact, she'd dreamed of that moment, over and over and over. But this dream was different. This dream wasn't about her fiancé at all. It had been about Clara. Walking out into the orange glow of a narrow alley lit with strange lanterns.

Muttering quietly to herself, "Let me be brave. Let me be brave."

Stopping and standing courageously, arms outstretched as a raven swooped towards her.

An agonizing scream, full of a pain unlike anything Aeryn had ever heard before. Almost inhuman in it's intensity.

Black smoke seeping from her nose and mouth….her limp body falling to the floor as the smoke transformed back into a raven and flew away to find it's next victim.

The Doctor standing helplessly in the doorway, horrified beyond words. And angry. So very angry.

It was only a dream, but it had shaken Aeryn deeply, regardless. Because somehow she knew what she'd just seen. And everything fell into place in that single instant of realisation. Why the Doctor had been so furious when she'd first met him. Why he refused to talk about Clara. Why he became so very sad whenever she was mentioned.

Aeryn understood him so much better in those few seconds. And yet that only made it all the worse. Because now she knew what had happened. Now she would understand that sad look in his eye, and she would feel it too.

Clara had been her friend as well. And somehow, not knowing what had happened, had made her absence easier to bare.

All around her, the TARDIS slowly came back to life, lights flickering on and casting the soothing, comforting glow from the various round panels on the walls, and the varying array of instruments scattered around the control panels, as the gentle hum started once more and the rotor rose once or twice, as if in greeting to her now that she was awake.

Sitting up slowly, Aeryn uncurled her legs from beneath her, sat forward and buried her head in her hands, sobbing quietly.

The tears that ran between her fingers then were tears of grief, anger and if she was being brutally honest - fear as well.

The time machine let out a low whine of sympathy and what sounded like concern, and through her tears, Aeryn smiled gratefully.

"Thanks. But I'll be all right in a moment," she sniffed, taking several deep, shuddering breaths and then composing herself enough that the tears were no longer falling thick and fast, she disentangled herself from the blanket that the Doctor had draped over her, then stood up and stretched a little before descending the stairs and heading for the door.

"Where's the Doctor?"

There was another series of beeps from the console behind her, but she ignored them, because her head pounded furiously, the veins in her temple throbbed painfully and her whole body screamed in protest with every tiny movement from where she'd been curled up in one position for too long. She needed to get out of the stuffiness of the console room, because as big as the TARDIS was on the inside, she needed fresh air to clear her mind.

So she moved over to the doorway and pulled it open, then stepped out into the meadow beyond. Her weakened legs struggled to hold her up as she staggered before giving way completely, dropping her to her knees in the fresh spring grass. Tilting her head back and closing her eyes, as her fingers wove between the strands of grass, she took several deep breaths to calm herself. And that was when she became suddenly aware of her breath. She sounded like she'd been running.

Opening her eyes carefully again to the sight of the meadow in the early evening light, she reached up to her throbbing head and felt the mixture of sweat and tears on her cheeks. Another several shuddering breaths, trying to calm her wild nerves and piece together everything that was going on, then she once again stood up, using the woodwork of the TARDIS to help her.

Stepping back inside, she palmed away the last remnants of the tears, and walked up to the console. "Okay...so where do we go from here? Please tell me the Doctor has a plan?"

The TARDIS didn't speak to her, though Aeryn would have been amazed if she had. Instead, she let out a string of beeps from the far side of the console, and curiously, Aeryn stepped round to see what was going on. Three words had appeared on the monitor, along with an arrow pointing down.

PUT THESE ON.

Beneath the monitor, a pair of aviator sunglasses had been sat amongst the various dials and other instruments. Aeryn reached out and took them cautiously, confused as she studied them. They looked like a perfectly ordinary pair of sun glasses.

"You're sure?" She asked. Then she shrugged, thinking 'what the hell' and slipped them on.

Almost immediately there was a loud crackle of static akin to a radio tuning in to a signal, and her ears popped, giving everything a tinny echo for a few seconds, before they settled back to normal again.

"What the hell was that?!"

 _"_ _Ah, Hoppity! Hello! Welcome back to the land of the living!_ " The Doctor's voice echoed in her ear and she spun on the spot, expecting to see him standing behind her. But there was no-one there. She was alone.

"Doctor?! Where the hell are you?!"

" _That's a good question. Can I get back to you on that? Oh, I borrowed Dessert Thunder by the way. Hope you don't mind."_

"How….how are you doing this?" She asked, spinning on the spot again.

 _"Doing what?"_

"Talking to me."

 _"Through the glasses. Don't ask how. If I tried to explain, I'd lose you in the techno babble, so it's just easier if you accept that they work, and leave it at that. Do you like them? I made them especially for you."_

"Yeah, they're...uh…..you made them for me? Why?"

 _"Because you'll be needing them shortly. Listen, I need you to do something for me. I need you to use the scanner to pick up the tracking device on Dessert Thunder. You're going to be my eyes."_

"How?"

 _"_ _I linked your shades to mine. How do you think we're having this conversation now? That also means I can see what you're seeing."_

She took the glasses off, turned them round and looked into the lenses. "Seriously?"

There was no longer any sound however, so she realised that they must work like a communications device that you had to hold up to your ear, in order to be able to hear. Turning them round and slipping them back on, she was just in time to catch the end of the Doctor's rant about her being a pudding brain.

"I heard that!"

 _"_ _And what's wrong with your eyes? They look like they've been leaking."_

"Nothing," she replied quickly, then cringed. That answer had been TOO quick.

 _"_ _Aeryn, what's wrong?"_

It was the first time he'd used her actual, proper name and it caught her completely off guard, the way he said it with so much care and concern, that she could feel herself welling up again. She very nearly told him as well, but managed to catch herself just in time. "A dream," she tried to sound casual, like it was nothing out of the ordinary. "Just a dream, that's all."

 _"_ _Hmmm,"_ he didn't sound convinced, but thankfully he left it at that. _"Okay, here's what I need you to do."_

After talking her through how to use the scanner to pull up the information that he needed, she was then made to stand and stare at it for several minutes, because every time she turned away, he snapped at her until she turned back again. Eventually, though, it seemed like he'd done what he needed to.

 _"Right, I've downloaded the schematics to my sonic shades. Meet me at the old church ruins and we can put phase two of the plan into action."_

"Phase two?"

 _"Well I haven't really thought that far ahead, but I'm sure there'll be a phase two. Would be a bit silly if we went from phase one to phase three, after all."_

"Sure," she shook her head in bewilderment. Sometimes he was impossible to keep up with.

 _"Oh and Hoppity?"_ His concern was gone now, so she was back to being Hoppity again. That was okay – she'd started to quite like the nickname. It was most definitely growing on her.

"Yes Doctor?"

 _"One more thing. Your shades have a 'mirror' setting on them. Right hand side, there should be a little switch that's currently pointing forward?"_

She reached up and felt along the thin metallic arm until she found what he was talking about. And as he'd said, it was pointed forwards. "Got it."

 _"Switch it half way."_

Carefully, she turned the tiny lever so that it was half way, and then blinked in surprise. Because the lenses of the glasses had split in half to show two very different images. The two halves that were closest to the center still showed the console in front of her, but now the two outer halves were showing the staircase behind her, and the armchair at the top.

"Uh...what?"

 _"Now you quite literally have eyes in the back of your head,"_ he beamed proudly and she could well imagine his smug looking face then as he spoke. _"Switch it all the way and you'll have complete backwards vision. Only problem is, you'll be blind to anything in front of you. So I'd stick with the fifty/fifty if I were you."_

She twisted the switch, just to check it out, and sure enough now she couldn't see anything in front of her, just whatever was behind her. She turned in a slow circle, and laughed at the insanity of it all.

 _"Remember, don't look the basilisk directly in the eye. Use the mirrors."_

Her laughter stopped short as she was reminded why she was out here in the first place. For just a few brief hours, she'd forgotten about all that, and it had been wonderful! But now she was back to reality, and she had a job to do.

Switching the lenses back to half and half, she headed for the door. "Okay Doctor, I'm on my way. But what do I do if I find it? Or rather, it finds me?"

 _"Run."_

"But it's fast!"

 _"Then run faster!"_

"Bloody alien!" She grumbled, pulling the blue door closed behind her, digging her hands into her jacket pockets and starting off in the direction of the old, abandoned church ruins.


	9. Run!

Aeryn had never been afraid of the woods. Living in this kingdom for two thousand years, give or take, she'd come to know every inch of it like the back of her hand. She'd even go so far as to say she could navigate her way through the woods blindfolded.

Which, ironically, was what she was effectively doing now. With the fifty/fifty split vision of her special glasses, she only had a small window to look through and see what was in front of her, and it was rather distracting, having a view of what was behind her at all times as well. Movements kept making her pause and her eyes would flicker to the mirrors, only to realise it was just her imagination and she was seeing things.

Or was she? She couldn't help the strange and disconcerting feeling that she was being watched.

A rustle from behind her caused her to spin rapidly on the spot, all senses suddenly on high alert, and she decided to amend her original statement.

She'd never been afraid of these woods...until now.

The church wasn't far away – just on the other side of this next clearing she was about to come to. Quickening her pace, she focussed on getting there as quickly as she could, though her eyes continually flicked to the mirrors as she checked what was behind her, scaring herself as she began to panic.

"There's nothing there," she told herself quietly. "There's nothing there. There's nothing there. There's - "

Something large and black slid across the mirrors, and she froze, not even daring to breath as she watched, her heart skipping several beats before turning up the pace and starting it's own rapid drum role, which only seemed to highlight the state of panic she was now in.

Very slowly, and letting out her breath as quietly as she could, she reached up with a trembling hand and flicked the switch on the arm so that the vision became completely mirrored, blocking out whatever was in front of her. Now she was blind to what she was facing, but she could see everything that was happening behind her, and very much wished she couldn't.

A huge black mass was slithering silently through the trees about thirty feet away, leaving a trail of dead foliage in it's wake. It's body was enormous – as round as three men were wide, and so long that she'd been watching it for a good ten seconds now, and it was still coming – the scales pulsating and the muscles moving as it propelled itself along in a way that only snakes can.

But if that was the body, then where was the head?

A movement in front of her caused her to once again hitch in her breath and hold it, but remaining still was becoming increasingly difficult through her tremors of fear.

"Doctor?" She whimpered in the lightest whisper she could manage. "Doctor!"

 _"Everything all right Hoppity? What's keeping you so long? I thought I might die of old age before you get here, and believe me that's saying something."_

"Doctor," she whispered. "Look!"

There was a moment's pause, and then, _"Ah. We_ _ll_ _then...wasn't expecting that. You're not looking directly at it, are you? No, course you're not, you're using the mirror setting. Smart. Well done. Which leaves us with a problem. Question:_ _I_ _f the tail of the basilisk is behind you, where is it's head?"_

She didn't want to speak, because somehow she could sense that whatever was in front of her was getting closer.

 _"Conclusion: It's probably in front of you and you can't see it. Not so smart. Can you switch your glasses back to forward view?"_

Despite her best efforts to remain silent and not draw attention to herself, she couldn't help it. "You told me not to look directly at it!"

 _"Good point. Okay, do it anyway, but close your eyes. I'll look for you. Tell you what's in front of you."_

"I'm not sure I want to know," she whimpered, closing her eyes and very, very slowly reaching up to change the settings on the glasses again. "Here goes..."

Squinting her eyes tightly shut, she had to resist the urge to open them and look for herself, as she stood waiting for one of two things to happen. Either the basilisk had found her, and she was about to become it's next meal, or -

A hand grasped hers and she shrieked in fright, her eyes snapping open involuntarily to see the Doctor standing in front of her.

"Run!"

She didn't need telling twice, and the pair of them took off in the opposite direction to the way she'd seen the basilisk heading. There was a loud roar behind them, and crashing sounds. Something was being dragged across the forest floor behind them – a massive bulk, and it didn't take a genius to work out what.

Aeryn reached up and flicked her shades to fifty/fifty, and sure enough there was the basilisk, right on their tail, and gaining fast. And it was truly a creature of nightmares! The head alone was the size of a small car, with a crown of horns on it's head, earning it the nickname 'king of the serpents'. And it had blood red, evil eyes, fangs the length of her forearms, a forked tongue that could easily bare a striking resemblance to a pitchfork, and was probably just as sharp…

"Split up!" the Doctor shouted, letting go of her hand and pushing her one way. He turned the other, and without stopping or even breaking a stride, Aeryn continued to run for her life, leaping over fallen logs, ducking low branches and stumbling through dense undergrowth, not daring to look back.

...

As she reached the edge of the forest, and came upon a sudden drop that led over the edge of a cliff to some raging rapids about seventy feet below, she finally skidded to a halt and turned to look back, bending double to catch her breath. Had she lost it? She'd tried to weave and double back as much as possible, creating what she hoped was an impossible trail to follow. And it seemed like it had worked.

About a quarter of a mile further along, the Doctor emerged onto a similar cliff edge and waved to her, but she didn't hear what he was trying to shout. Not until he began to point frantically back the way they'd both come.

She turned very slowly, a sudden chill running down her spine as the bushes parted and something big pushed it's way through.

Spinning rapidly to turn her back on the creature and avoid looking it directly in the eye, Aeryn saw that it was indeed the basilisk. It had found her. And she had nowhere left to run.

Caught between a rock and a hard place – or rather a deadly snake and a very long drop – she now had a choice. She had to assess the situation in a split second and decide. Which would be the worse fate?

Seeing the image of the creature as it loomed behind her, baring it's fangs and coiling itself ready for the strike, she came to the quickest decision she'd ever made.

Mind you, it really was no contest, and as the basilisk lunged forward, she pulled the glasses off, shoved them in the pocket of her jacket, took a running jump and leapt off the edge of the cliff, out into the wide open expanse of air. For a moment – one brief, glorious moment – it felt like she was flying. Time seemed to slow, and she felt weightless and free.

The basilisk's jaws snapped shut in the place she'd been just seconds before with a resounding crack, and then she was falling. Her stomach lurched and her arms and legs flailed helplessly as she dropped.

Ten feet.

Twenty feet.

Thirty.

Fifty.

The water was rising rapidly now, and there was a loud rushing in her ears. She couldn't even breath, let alone scream, and the force of the drop brought tears to her eyes. Though that could also have been the sudden knowledge of what was coming next, as well.

To say she was scared was an understatement, but there was nothing she could do. Except keep falling, and try to prepare herself with the few seconds she had left.

Bracing for the impact, which she knew was going to hurt a hell of a lot more than anything else she'd ever experienced in her life, she tried her best to keep her feet together, and her arms by her sides. No point trying to dive head first – even she knew that was suicide. Besides she didn't have the time to twist herself now. All she could do was fall, and hope.

Slamming into the water was like hitting concrete and she lost consciousness almost instantly, the Doctor's scream as he called her name the last thing she heard, before the blackness consumed her.

The Doctor watched as Aeryn made the bravest and boldest decision of her life, by leaping out into the open expanse of air that would surely lead to her death. A human could survive the fall, providing they went in feet first which Aeryn had done...but Aeryn was fragile. So very fragile, and the fall alone would kill her for sure. As soon as she hit the water, she'd fracture into a thousand pieces. And if, by some small miracle she survived, the raging rapids would most definitely drown her within minutes. Not to mention the rocks and other deadly assortment of objects beneath the surface that could cause her all manner of harm.

For the second time in as many months, he'd been forced to watch a good person – a good friend of his – choose the manner of their own death, and face it with as much courage and dignity as they could under the circumstances, leaving him to pick up the pieces in the aftermath.

Clara had faced the raven, and Aeryn had leapt off a cliff, choosing that death to the admittedly more terrifying one of the basilisk which was even now peering over the edge, watching for any sign of life from the rapids below.

But whilst Aeryn went into the water, she never surfaced again. She was lost, and the Doctor was once again alone.

The basilisk snorted in annoyance and turned away to find another victim instead, and the Doctor stood watching for several minutes longer, hoping and praying that the Caerleon girl would surprise him. She was a fighter. She'd told him herself that she'd endured this long. Two thousand years of life, of memories and emotions and thoughts and feelings and laughter and sadness, all snuffed out in an instant. Literally washed away.

He'd have to tell her father.

Sucking in a sharp breath, the Doctor wondered which way the basilisk had gone. Because right then, looking that foul creature in the eye was a lot more appealing than the thought of facing the Governor and telling him that his daughter had died.

A few minutes later, however, he would come to regret this decision as he and the basilisk once again crossed paths.


	10. Telepathic Flights

Aeryn was bewildered.

Exactly that. Bewildered.

She couldn't understand - couldn't make sense of what was happening.

Pain flared across her entire body with every laboured breath and she was pulled continually into a blackness that cut out seconds - or perhaps it was even minutes - of the agony, making it that much harder to keep up with reality - if this was even reality and not just some twisted perverted version of the afterlife, or wherever it was that people supposedly went after they died.

Because she'd died, hadn't she? She'd leapt headlong into a raging, swirling river full of rocks and other debris. There was no way she could have survived. But it had either been death by drowning, or death by basilisk. She'd chosen the manner of her own demise, and she'd accepted it as she'd plunged towards the raging rapids below. She'd made her peace with it.

So why was she still conscious? Or at least why was her mind still conscious? Thinking all these thoughts, even if her body was momentarily disconnected and unable to respond to anything but the pain.

She tried to separate everything in her weary mind, which was easier said than done when wavering between moments of blackness and moments of an odd blueness.

The blackness was silent and didn't hurt, but she was still 'aware'.

The blueness was accompanied by odd, muffled sounds and it felt like she'd been hit by a herd of stampeding horses, burned alive, done ten rounds with a judoon and fallen from the top of one of the parapets of the castle, all at the same time.

There were smells as well - blood and stone, mingled with the fresh scent of flowers and another smell that she couldn't quite place. Grass, perhaps?

The air was fresh, at least, and flooded her lungs in ragged gasps, confirming that she was breathing. The dead don't breathe. And neither do they dream...or think. And they're certainly not aware of their surroundings. She could taste something in her mouth as well. Was that water?

Blackness slowly gave way to a blur as something damp and cold touched one side of her brow, followed by a gentle splashing sound.

Slowly, she flexed one finger. Then another. Her hand curled into a painful fist. Then she wiggled her toes. Finally, the rest of her body began to comply, and after several long seconds of flexing the cramp and stiffness slowly from her joints, she determined that she must be laying on her front, somewhere.

She made the mistake of slowly blinking her eyes open to bright sunlight reflected off crystal clear water, making her wince. Her vision was blurry, and her head throbbed with an insistent and unpleasant pounding. Blinking again, her eyes finally adjusted enough to see, and she raised her head ever so slightly, to let her eyes roam around some more, building a picture of her surrounding as the blur gradually cleared. She was lying on a bank of pebbles and other rocks, half submerged in shallow water at the edge of the river. By some small miracle although there was water around her head, it had been shallow enough not to completely cover her nose and mouth, which had allowed her to breath and not drown completely.

She moved one hand slowly, placing it flat beside her and giving a tentative push to test how her body would respond. She immediately wished she hadn't.

The pain was incredible, and she let out an agonised gasp, the breath literally knocked from her as her arm gave way and she fell back into the pool of water again with a light splash, managing to just about keep her face clear of the water and now that she was fully conscious and breathing again, she coughed up a lungful of it that she'd inevitably swallowed at some point without realising.

After several long seconds to gather her strength, she tried again, and managed to eventually push herself up onto her hands and knees and crawl slowly further up and out of the water, until only her feet remained in the shallows. Before she could pull herself out completely, the pain became too unbearable and she sank once again back into the soft grass this time, coughing up even more water and spluttering as she fought for breath, her eyes squinting closed as pain racked through her whole body.

When she was able to open her eyes again, she had no idea how much time had passed whilst she'd been unconscious, but after studying her wrist watch for a long time and forcing her eyes to focus, she determined that it must have been several hours. Slumping back into the grass again and giving one last heaving cough, she rolled herself onto her back and slowly her other senses came drifting back to her in fits and starts as she began to piece together exactly where she must be.

Lifting her head gingerly - just her head, this time, not the rest of her body, (after all, it was her chest, in particular that hurt the most, so perhaps if she only moved her head, she'd be spared the pain?) she couldn't raise it very far before the pain hit again, however, and she realised how wrong she'd been, clenching her teeth in agony, slumping back down and blinking in surprise as she saw out of the corner of her eye, something that made her sigh in relief and smile.

Once she'd recovered enough to be able to make a move, she stubbornly tried again, determined to get up, regardless of the pain she would inevitably inflict upon herself in the process. Lifting her head very slowly, learning from her earlier mistake, she sat herself up, then shakily pulled herself back to her feet, wobbled unsteadily for a moment, and then staggered towards the TARDIS.

By sheer luck, or coincidence – she wasn't sure which, and neither did she care either – she'd washed up at the edge of the meadow where the Doctor had parked the time machine. And as she half walked, half stumbled back in it's general direction, something fell out of the sopping folds of her jacket.

Bending down, she found the aviator glasses blinking back up at her, one of the lenses cracked but otherwise they still looked pretty much in tact. She gave another triumphant cry of relief as she quickly pulled them back on and felt the familiar ear-popping sensation that she'd quickly gotten used to when wearing them. Her voice came out in a hoarse croak at first when she tried, but after a few attempts she got it working again. "Doctor? Doctor!"

His voice, when he replied, was incredulous, albeit incredibly tinny and crackly from where the glasses had taken a hell of a beating, just as she had. _"Aeryn?!"_

"Doctor, it's me!" she exclaimed, holding back tears as she was suddenly overwhelmed by everything that had happened to her in the last few hours, in particular.

 _"_ _You're alive!"_

"Yeah….yeah I am….I'm all right….Just a little battered and bruised, but I'll be fine."

 _"_ _Where are you?"_

"Would you believe back at the TARDIS?"

His laughter echoed in her ears and she found herself joining him, finally stumbling up to the wooden Police Box and leaning against it heavily. "Doctor, where are you?"

 _"_ _I, uh….might have climbed a tree and got myself stuck."_

She didn't have the energy to be surprised by this, so she just heaved herself up again as much as she could and stepped round the TARDIS to the door. "Doctor, I can't get in. The door's locked."

 _"_ _Why would you want to get in?"_

"In case that thing comes back and tries to finish the job?!"

 _"_ _A_ _h_ _you'll be fine. Just_ _check your pocket, I'm sure I dropped a key in there at some point..._ _._ _possibly..._ _"_

"You don't sound too convinced."

 _"_ _Well I'm not sure_ _it hasn't fallen out after your impression of an Olympic diver...eight points, by the way_ _._ _I wanted to give you a nine, but the take off was a bit haphazard, and the entry could have been better. Needs more work I'm afraid before it's worthy of a nine or a ten._ _"_

"Well at least I got an eight. Better than nothing, right?" Aeryn chuckled, as she fumbled in each of her pockets, searching. "And what if there isn't a key?"

 _"_ _Ask her really nicely. That usually did the trick for Clara. Once the two of them got over their differences, I mean."_

"Okay….I've got a key!" She grinned triumphantly, pulling it out and slotting it into the door, which swung smoothly open for her. She stumbled inside and very nearly burst into tears of joy again at how safe she felt all of a sudden. Especially when the door swung gently shut behind her and she was enveloped in what had quickly become a now very familiar and comforting sound to her. The gentle hum of power and the quiet beeps and bleeps of the various parts of the console.

"Thank you," she whispered reverently, running a hand over the metal railing. "Thank you."

The time rotor rose and fell once, and she smiled, taking that as a greeting. Then she raised a hand, adjusted the glasses on her nose slightly, and said "I'm in!"

 _"_ _Brilliant. Now you can come and get me, and we can put phase two into practice."_

"Hang on a sec, phase two? Wasn't that the running for our life and surviving certain death, part?"

 _"No time to get technical, Hoppity-"_

"And we're back to Hoppity again..."

 _"_ _Now look, I need you to come get me. Like I said, I'm in a tree, and I'm stuck."_

"How are you stuck, exactly? Don't tell me you're afraid of heights."

 _"_ _I am when there's a sleeping basilisk wrapped round the bottom of the trunk!"_

"Oh," she winced. "Yeah, I can see why that would be a problem. Uh, yeah…..I'll uh….I'll go and get the cavalry and they can, uh….rescue you." She floundered, suddenly realising that she actually had no idea what to do. She'd never been in a situation like this before. At least not on her own.

 _"_ _The cavalry?"_ The Doctor scoffed. _"What are they going to do? Throw themselves at it as a distraction and get themselves killed? No, I need you to bring the TARDIS. I reckon this branch could_ _just about_ _hold her_ _for_ _long enough."_

"Doctor, you're forgetting one very important thing."

 _"_ _Oh? And what's that?"_

She felt terrible saying it, as she walked up to the central console. But it needed to be done. "Doctor…..I'm not Clara."

There was a long, lonely silence then, and she cringed, collapsing onto the bottom step of the flight that lead up to the upper level and face palming at her own stupidity.

"Doctor?" She asked quietly as she finally unwound the soggy, useless bandage from her hand and dropped it to one side. Then she peeled off her sopping leather jacket and that pooled into a mound as well. "Doctor, I didn't mean...I'm sorry. It's just, I have no idea how to fly this thing..."

 _"_ _No, no you're right. Of course. I need to go back to the beginning again. Start from scratch. But first things first, look at the state of you!"_

"What do you mean?" She glanced around, expecting to once again see him, only to realise belatedly that the shared vision aspect of the glasses must also still be working.

 _"_ _Check your reflection,"_ he sighed. She glanced up to the monitor screen, which was blank and clearly showed her reflection back to her. Blood was dribbling slowly down one half of her face from a shallow gash across her temple. She'd mistaken the blood for water, however, and hadn't actually realised.

She also had another nicely developing black eye and a bruised cheek. And there was most definitely at least three, maybe even four cracked ribs that she could feel. A busted collar bone, broken ankle….the list was endless. But right now she couldn't think about any of that. Because thinking about herself was a slippery slope that would only lead to self doubt, and ultimately failure to believe that they could do this.

She needed to stay strong. And to do that, she needed to focus on something else instead of her own physical weakness. Rescuing the Doctor was as good a distraction as any.

"I'll be fine," she insisted, pulling herself back to her feet, unclasping her waterlogged PDA from her belt and dumping that with her jacket as well, then limping to the console. "First things first, we need to get you out of that tree. Tell me what to do, Doctor."

 _"There's a panel of the console to your right, looks like a jellyfish."_

"That thing?" She asked, turning her head to look at what she assumed her was talking about.

 _"_ _Yes. Place your fingers inside. All of them, up to the knuckles and just hold on tight. If anything bites, let it."_

"If anything bites?" She asked worriedly, even as she limped her way round to stand in front of it. Then, against her better judgement, she slid her fingers into the spongy folds, right up to the knuckles as instructed. "Doctor, what is this?"

 _"_ _TARDIS telepathic interface. You're now in mental contact with the TARDIS, so don't think anything rude."_

"Why not?"

 _"_ _It might end up on all the screens. The TARDIS is extrapolating your entire timeline, from the moment of your birth, to the moment of your death."_

"Which I do not need a preview of!"

Again there was a slight pause, before the Doctor said quietly, almost to himself, _"Clara once said exactly the same thing."_

"I'm sorry."

 _"_ _Okay, look to your left. There's a lever with a red button above it, yes? Without taking your hands from the interface, hit that lever down."_

"What do you think I am? An octopus?!" She snapped, seeing no physical way of being able to do that.

 _"Last time I checked you had two legs, didn't you? Or have you lost one and not told me?"_

"You're a real pain in the -" she reached up with her foot as she was grumbling, balancing precariously on the foot that she was pretty sure was broken, and gritting her teeth, her words cutting off mid flow at the sudden shooting flare of pain up her leg. But she kept stretching, and managed to just about catch the lever with the toe of her boot, flipping it down as instructed.

 _"_ _Good, that's turned off the safeguards and navigation, slaving the TARDIS to you. Focus on me, and me alone. The TARDIS will track your subconscious and extract the relevant information. It should be able to home in on me, from your memories. Now, there's another lever on your right this time. That's the handbrake. Flip it down, and that will start the TARDIS flying."_

Aeryn swore under her breath as she swapped feet and used her right leg to flip this much easier to reach lever down as well. Suddenly something clamped round her fingers, and she let out a shriek of surprise, almost toppling over as the whole TARDIS shook and she struggled to steady herself back on two feet again.

 _"Now don't get distracted. Remember, you're flying a time machine. If you don't get this right, you could land on top of me. Or worse. On top of the basilisk."_

"So no pressure then."

 _"Just concentrate on me. Listen to my voice, and think about where I am. Let the TARDIS find me. Yes! That's it! You're almost there! You're almost – no, no no no!"_

"What? Doctor, what is it? What?!"

 _"You've got to think of somewhere else, now! Think of it, now!"_

"Where?"

 _"Anywhere, doesn't matter! DO IT!"_

"Doctor, what's -" the whole TARDIS suddenly shook violently again, and the cloister bell began to toll all around her, warning of the danger they were now in. Without thinking, she wrenched her fingers from the interface and ran to the door. "Doctor, what's happened?!"

 _"NO!"_ He shouted suddenly, a command so fierce she literally skidded to a halt. _"Do not open that door! Right now it's the only thing keeping you alive!"_

"Is now a good time to tell you I'm scared?" She whispered, backing away from the door obediently.

 _"And so you should be,"_ he replied equally as quietly. _"I'm projecting the view from my sonic shades to yours. Take a look."_

And all of a sudden the view through the glasses changed, and she could see outside the box. And what she saw, made her blood run cold. Somehow, she'd managed to land the TARDIS on the forest floor, and woken the basilisk. Now it had curled it's massive body round the time machine, constricting and swamping it in coils of black mass. It's gaping jaws were opened wide over the doorway, and it's huge fangs were lodged deeply into the blue woodwork.

It was trapped, but it had no intention of letting go anyway, and was trying to widen it's jaws even further by dislocating the bottom. It was trying to swallow the TARDIS whole. With her still inside it.

"Doctor!" She screamed. "Doctor what do I do?!"

 _"_ _Phase three!"_ He called back as the view on her glasses switched back to normal mode again.

"What the hell is phase three?!"

 _"Use the TARDIS interface, focus on a supernova. Doesn't matter which one, take your pick. Let the TARDIS know where you want her to go. Take the creature into deep space, and it'll die. It's the only way."_

"I don't think I can," she whimpered, staggering as the TARDIS shook again, knocking her off her feet.

 _"_ _You can and you will! You have a responsibility to act, and now you have the ability as well!"_

Well, that did it. Quoting her own words back to her was all the motivation she needed. Picking herself back up again, she dug her fingers back into the panel of the TARDIS, closed her eyes and thought harder than she'd ever thought before. She thought about the sun and the stars and space. She thought about the basilisk drifting away, limp and lifeless into a black void of nothingness, and with a determination she never even knew she possessed, she kicked both levers, as before, and the time rotor rose and fell, there was a loud wheezing, and from outside the doors, a terrible screeching.

 _"_ _You're doing it! That's it!"_ The Doctor encouraged. But his voice was starting to break up, and the crackle was becoming more and more insistent.

"Doctor, I'm losing you."

 _"_ _I expect…...will…..space…..signal…..no…...worry…..fine…."_ And then he was gone completely.

"Doctor? Doctor?"

The rotor in the central column gave one last heaving groan and stopped, and a sudden stillness fell over everything.

Extracting her fingers very carefully, Aeryn reached over and pulled the monitor towards her. "Okay, how do we do this? Do I….do I ask you really nicely and you show me what's going on? Or….I dunno. Please, help me? Please? Because I'm alone and I'm in pain….so, so much pain and... I don't know what I'm doing….and I'm really in over my head here. So please? Please…. help me?"

She pulled the aviators off and dropped them into the mound of other discarded objects she'd left in a pile nearby, now that they were no longer in use.

Just as the despair was catching up to her again, and the pain was kicking in, overpowering the adrenaline she'd been running on until that moment, she choked back a sob and bit her lip, clenching her hands into fists and just hoping and praying that this nightmare would end soon. She was going to wake up, and find out this had all been some terrible dream.

The screen flickered and then blinked to life and she saw what was quite possibly the most beautiful thing she had ever seen. A sea of inky blackness at the edges of the screen, with a brilliant, vibrant purplish pink explosion of colour in the very centre, and stars twinkling distantly as tendrils of the supernova wove out and danced about on the screen like living flames of energy.

Sinking back onto the step again, she watched the screen in awe for a long time, before finally something clicked in her mind. "Wait…..where's the basilisk?"

In answer to her question, the TARDIS door swung slowly open. Picking herself up again, she heaved and dragged her way over, sinking down to sit at the very edge and gaze out. The view from here was even more spectacular than it had been on the screen.

And right in the very centre, growing rapidly smaller and smaller, was a snake-like form, limp and lifeless, drifting away into the heart of the dying star.

They'd done it. They'd actually done it. Despite the impossible odds, they'd saved Elysium from the basilisk. No more people were going to die.

"We did it," she laughed, even as the first of several tears splashed down her cheek. "We did it!" And then she leant out as far as she dared, and let out the loudest whoop of joy she could physically muster. Again and again. And damn, it felt so good! "WE DID IT!"

Then she collapsed backwards, laying on the floor and laughing and crying, and punching a fist into the air and celebrating. Which was when, for the first time as she lay there, she felt something digging into her leg, and sat up again, delving into the pocket of her trousers to retrieve something that she never left home without. Ever.

A chess piece. The white queen. Holding it reverently in both hands, she shuffled across the floor back to the open doorway, and gazed out again. "What do you think, Maric?" She whispered quietly, looking from the beautiful swirl of colours beyond the doorway, then down to the chess piece in her hand, then back again. "Beautiful, isn't it?"

She could have sat there for the rest of eternity, she decided then, and the view would never cease to amaze her. But a low groan from the time rotor reminded her that she didn't have that luxury. There was someone waiting for her back on Elysium.

Someone who's motor she'd nicked. Involuntarily, and with good reason, of course.

Tucking the chess piece back into her pocket again, she set about trying to focus her mind back on the task at hand so that she could get back home again. But even as she was sliding her fingers back into the console, an idea came to her, and she knew then what she needed to do.

There was one slight detour she needed to make before she returned the borrowed TARDIS to it's rightful owner.

"Well you took your sweet time!" The Doctor huffed as he marched into the TARDIS, kicking the door shut behind him. "Do you know how long I've had to wait for you to come back? Three days! Three whole, very long, excruciatingly boring days! I hate going the long way round! Has anyone ever told you that?!"

"And has anyone ever told you that your navigation system's buggered?" Aeryn groaned, withdrawing her fingers from the telepathic interface of the console and leaning heavily on it for support.

"Only when I turn it off. Besides, that makes it all the more fun!" He was already slamming down levers and twisting dials to reset the various settings now that the telepathic interface was no longer needed.

"Not when you've got a rookie behind the wheel! A rookie who, did I mention, is broken in about ten million different places?"

"Oh stop exaggerating, I'm sure you'll be fine." He waved a hand dismissively. And then he glanced to her, and saw the expression she was wearing, seemingly for the first time. "What? What is it?"

"I've been thinking."

"Uh oh. Should I be worried?"

"I owe you an apology."

"What for?" He stepped slowly round the console to stand beside her. She wasn't looking at him, though. Instead, she was staring at the blank monitor in front of her, staring at her own reflection, with the black eye, bruised cheek and dried blood trails down one half of her face.

"For what it's worth, I'm truly sorry for what I did to you. Back when we first met. I...I invaded your personal space. Oh hell, I invaded your mind! I NEVER do that without permission. Ever! And I didn't truly understand the hurt or the pain that it would cause you. I didn't stop to think of the consequences. And...I never even considered that if the roles were reversed and someone did that to me...how would I feel about it? So, because it's only fair, there's something I wanted to show you. I pulled Clara from your mind because she was right there, at the front, and you had so many memories of her, I figured she was someone who meant a lot to you. Someone of great importance. If anyone were ever to do that to me...this is who they'd see."

"You don't have to do this," he told her quietly, even as she closed her eyes, and her appearance changed before his very eyes. A mesmerising, fluid sliding transition from one form to another. She was taller now, a young male with bright blue eyes and close cropped brown hair. And the Doctor had a fairly good idea of who he was.

"Your fiancé?" he guessed, as she finally turned to look at him.

"Maric Blaez," she nodded, speaking in the deeper voice of Maric now.

"I'm sorry. How long ago did you lose him."

"Four centuries," she turned away from him to look at her reflection in the blank monitor screen. Her wounds had temporarily healed themselves and she was able to stand upright, unpained and uninhibited. "He was a hunter, just like those men you met when you first came here. But he never hunted for sport like they did. He never actually killed anything if he didn't have to. He protected the kingdom from predators and kept us all fed each winter. But he never took trophies, and he always spared lives whenever he could. One day there was an accident. He was shot by a stray bullet. It wasn't anybody's fault. Just wrong place, wrong time. But the men he was with all blamed each other – all turned on one another. Their families very nearly started an entire civil war. My father stepped in and told them all that they were dishonouring Maric's memory by fighting, and that they should be ashamed of themselves. From that day on, the whole kingdom vowed that we'd never let anyone else die because of a stupid hunt."

She balled her hand into a fist and slammed it against the console, even as her strength failed and she was no longer able to keep up the image. Sliding back into her original, broken form, she stumbled and the Doctor caught her.

"That's why you stopped me from doing anything to those men," he realised. "Because of the promise to Maric."

"I panicked," she admitted quietly. "When I thought you were going to hurt them, I panicked. I thought I was going to fail his memory and – Doctor I'm so sorry for what I did."

He could see in the reflection of the monitor that she was crying now. Silent tears trickled down her cheeks to mingle with the blood and dirt from her recent adventures. First things first, before he even attempted to address everything she'd just told him, she needed medical treatment.

And he knew exactly where she could get it.

"Apology accepted," he told her gently, scooping her into his arms. She didn't protest. She was too weak and upset to protest. Though she did give him a curious look when he carried her through the TARDIS door to reveal he'd parked them in her private bathroom.

"Don't worry," he smiled, crouching down to sit her at the edge of one of the bath tubs. "I promise I won't look."

She just laughed as she slid herself painfully into the healing waters, fully clothed, and submerged herself below the surface.

The Doctor, meanwhile, kept true to his word and headed for the door, pausing only to study the music console for a moment. It was highly sophisticated technology, of that he had no doubts at all. Yet docked right in the middle was a very old, battered iPod. It's screen was cracked, it's casing scratched and damaged and it was incredibly old by technological standards. Well over several thousand years old, at least. How it was still working was a miracle that even he couldn't figure without pulling it apart and dissecting every tiny millimetre of it. But he wasn't going to do that, because it belonged to Aeryn, and it apparently held some sentimental value to her, considering how she'd tried to preserve it as much as possible, given it's age.

Reaching out to the controls, he flicked the music on and skipped through a couple of the songs, until he came to one that he recognised.

 _Like a small boat,_ _  
_ _On the ocean,_ _  
_ _Sending big waves,_ _  
_ _Into motion,_ _  
_ _Like how a single word,_ _  
_ _Can make a heart open,_ _  
_ _I might only have one match,_ _  
_ _But I can make an explosion_

He knew that song! Where had he heard it before? Where did he know it from?

 _And all those things I didn't say  
Wrecking balls inside my brain  
I will scream them loud tonight  
Can you hear my voice this time?_

He closed his eyes, and entered what he often called the Storm Room – an imaginary TARDIS inside his mind, where he could think and solve puzzles and voice his thoughts aloud, where only he could hear them. It was the same Storm Room he'd retreated to during the four and a half billion years of torture he'd endured when trapped in his own confession dial.

And, just like then, he wasn't alone now either. Clara was wandering about the TARDIS, humming the tune lightly as she wandered, singing the words under her breath.

 _This is my fight song  
Take back my life song  
Prove I'm all right song  
My power's turned on  
Starting right now I'll be strong  
I'll play my fight song  
And I don't really care if nobody else believes  
'Cause I've still got a lot of fight left in me_

When she saw him watching her, she smiled and pulled out the ear buds she'd been wearing. His eyes followed the white wires down to a small device in her hand, which she held up for him to see. A device that looked exactly like the one that was now plugged into the console in Aeryn's bathroom. Except it was newer and less beaten. But it was exactly the same, regardless. And that was where he realised he'd heard this song before.

Snapping back to the present, he looked again to the iPod in the docking station, and frowned. This device had belonged to Clara. It was hers. Not just a copy, or one that looked similar. It was actually hers. He confirmed this a moment later as he flicked through some of the images that had also been saved on it. They were hard to see through the gigantic crack in the screen, but they were unmistakable, never the less. This was Clara's ipod.

He turned back to look in the direction of the bathtub, despite promising that he wouldn't look, and saw Aeryn leaning on the edge still fully clothed, water dripping down her face which was no longer blood streaked, an unreadable expression in her eyes as she watched him.

He pointed to the iPod. "This doesn't belong to you."

"It was a gift."

"From who?"

"I think you already know."

"How? When?"

She simply shook her head then turned her back on him. "Sorry Doctor. I'll explain everything, I promise. Just….not yet. Little preoccupied."

"Yes, sorry. I'll...uh….I'll be waiting outside."

And feeling suddenly rather sheepish, he stepped outside to wait for her. However long it would take.

The celebrations that evening were like nothing the Doctor had ever seen before. True, he usually cleared off before the clean up and aftermath got underway – he preferred to be the humble hero who stepped away without any thanks – but Aeryn had begged and pleaded with him to stay for just a little while. Just until she could clear his name with her father. It was, she'd insisted, the least she could do after everything he'd done for her and her kingdom.

She'd even convinced him to put on his tuxedo, and the Doctor had reluctantly agreed. After all, what was the rush? He had no-where else to be right then. So here he was now, a medal of honour pinned to his jacket and people smiling and thanking him over and over and over.

It really was rather boring, and he remembered why he didn't often do it now. But he'd promised Aeryn he wouldn't go anywhere without saying goodbye and despite his itchy feet, she still hadn't returned from the quiet word she'd asked to have with her father.

Eventually it all became too much for him, and after scooping a hand full of jelly babies from one of the bowls that had been laid out as part of a lavish feast for the celebrations, he went wandering through the corridors to try and find the young woman and her father, eventually finding her alone, staring out of a window and apparently lost in thought.

Slowly but surely in the kingdom beyond, life was returning. It was evening now, but birds chattered and sung in the trees and somewhere in the distance, children were laughing. In her hand, the Doctor could see that she was holding a chess piece – a white queen – and couldn't help but think it was oddly appropriate. A symbol of who she was, and everything she could ever be.

She looked so much better now. The long soak in the healing baths had fixed her right up and there wasn't even a trace that anything had ever happened to her. Not even so much as a paper cut, or a broken nail.

"You look lovely," he spoke gently as he moved to stand beside her. "I prefer you when you're not broken."

"Funnily enough, so do I," she smiled back. She looked to the medal on his chest, then back up to his face again. "My father's forgiven you, by the way."

"I should think so too," the Doctor huffed, polishing the medal with a sleeve. It was an insignificant little charm, as far as he was concerned. Worthless. But he owed it to her to at least try to be grateful. He offered her a jelly baby, and she took a couple of the red ones, munching on them thoughtfully.

"So," she looked down to the chess piece in her hand again when she'd finished the last one. "Where will you go now?"

He shrugged, even though she wouldn't see the motion because she wasn't looking at him. "Wherever the wind takes me, I suppose. You?"

Now it was Aeryn's turn to shrug. "Stay here, I guess. Same old, same old. Help my dad. Keep the peace. Be his poster girl for model citizen behaviour, or whatever it was that he told me I had to be. Basically just do as I'm told and let everyone see me doing it…." She sighed dejectedly, looking back up and out across the kingdom again. Night was falling, but it was no longer a threatening darkness. It was a soft, gentle one.

The Doctor cleared his throat in a slightly exaggerated fashion, and when she turned to see what he wanted, he held out his hand to her, uncurling his fingers to reveal a key – the very key she'd used to get herself into the TARDIS but had accidentally left in the doorway afterwards. She frowned at it in confusion not realising it was one and the same.

"What's that?"

"Your ticket to freedom," he told her. "Should you choose to accept it, of course. It's a key to the TARDIS, and I'm offering you a ride."

"To where?" She was trying not to let herself get too excited, he could tell. Almost as if this was too good to be true, and she didn't want to get her hopes up. But she took the key from him anyway.

"Anywhere you like!" He made a grand, sweeping arm gesture. "The whole of time and space, just waiting to be explored!"

"And...and you want me to come with you?"

"Only if you want to."

"But….but why me?"

"Why anyone?" He answered quietly. "Why did I choose Rose, or Martha, or Donna, or Amy and Rory? Why did I choose Clara?"

"Because they were special?" Aeryn guessed. "Doctor, I'm not special. I'm...I'm breakable! I'm a liability! You've seen that already."

"Aeryn, listen to me." He placed a hand on her shoulder and looked her directly in the eye then. "You are special, and don't you ever let anyone tell you otherwise. Do you understand? How many people can say they single-handedly defeated a basilisk with nothing but a pair of glasses? How many people can say they leapt off a cliff, into raging rapids, and survived? How many people can say they've done half the things you've done, and still be so modest about it?!"

"I can think of one," she smirked then, giving him a pointed look.

"Yes but this isn't about me." He let go of her shoulder and turned away, pacing a little. "Well, maybe it is. But since Clara's death, I've not been a good man. I've insulted her memory, and that is unforgivable. She was right when she told me that I'm very bad at being alone and...well this is me trying to make that up to her." He turned back to her then, a sad, almost desperate and pleading look in his eye. "This is me trying to be the man she always knew I could be. And I can't do it alone."

His eyes said it all then, even if his words didn't. _Please don't leave me alone any more. I want a friend. I want you to come with me, and be my pal._

How could she refuse such an offer?

"You say we can go anywhere?" She asked thoughtfully, choosing not to notice the Doctor punching the air in a silent cheer.

"Absolutely anywhere," he composed himself quickly, then held his hands out to her. "You choose. We could have lunch first, then breakfast after, because as time travellers, that's what we can do!"

"Can we go to Earth?" She asked, holding out the chess piece to him then. "Maric had a chess set that he picked up when we lived there, and he said there was this one song that reminded him of me. He had this made so that he could carry it with him and always remember me, because it's got a line of the song engraved on it. Could we go and listen to it, perhaps? Maybe if I start to remember Maric and all the good times we had together, instead of trying not to think of him because of the pain it causes….Oh I dunno….It's a stupid idea. Sorry, forget I said anything."

"I tell you what," the Doctor smiled, even as he began to steer her towards where he'd left the TARDIS (now parked outside the women's bathroom, thankfully). "You've left a small trace in the telepathic interface. If that song was dear to you and Maric, it shouldn't be too hard for the TARDIS to track it down. And I think it's a brilliant idea that we listen to it. How about live, in concert?"

"And all I have to do is think of that song?" Aeryn asked, her eyes lighting up with excitement as she picked up her pace and a very definitive spring emerged in her step.

"By all means sing it, if you know the words," the Doctor agreed eagerly, keeping pace easily enough beside her with his long strides. "I'll try and keep up on my guitar, if you like."

"Now THAT I can't wait to see!" She laughed, jogging the last few paces to the TARDIS and using her new key for the first time.

"You know what to do," the Doctor told her as he once again turned off the safeguards and navigation, then let the handbrake go.

Aeryn stepped confidently up to the TARDIS telepathic interface and slid her fingers inside, up to the knuckles. Then she closed her eyes, apparently focussing deeply on the song.

In reality, however, it wasn't the song she was focussing on. Closing her eyes made it easier to deceive the Doctor, only because she couldn't see his face, and therefore couldn't see the hurt she would most probably be inflicting upon him when he eventually found out where she was taking them. When he found out that what she'd told him about the song had been a lie.

Well, not that it wasn't Maric's favourite song. That part was true enough. And she DID want to hear it, because she was curious about it. But she'd been counting on the Doctor letting her fly once more, and that had been the only way she'd been able to work out how she could do it, without putting in dates or co-ordinates that would have given the game away.

But she wasn't deceiving him maliciously. Hell, she'd come to view him as one of her best friends. One of her only friends, in fact. And the thought of hurting him was almost unbearable. But it was for his own good. And someday she hoped that he might be able to find it in one of his hearts to forgive her.


	11. Fight Song

As the TARDIS settled in it's designated landing spot and Aeryn and the Doctor stepped out into what appeared to be someone's living room, they looked all about in confusion.

"Well this wasn't what I was expecting. I thought we were going to a concert, or something?" Aeryn frowned, placing her hands on her hips. "Are we in the right place?"

"How should I know? You're the driver!" The Doctor nudged a few magazines with his boot, noting how the TARDIS had strewn papers everywhere during her rather windy landing.

"I'm gonna have a look around," Aeryn told him, heading out into the hallway. A couple of minutes later, her head peered back round the door frame. "Oh and maybe you should make sure whoever lives here knows we're here. I'd imagine they might not be too happy at the mess you've made."

"At the mess I've made?!" He scoffed incredulously. But she'd already gone, and after a few seconds he heard the sound of a door opening and closing again.

He looked all around at the room. And then froze.

"I know this place," he realised, as a cold feeling of dread suddenly crept over him. "I know this place! Why do I know this place?!"

Crossing the room in three long strides, he stopped in front of the floor to ceiling shelving units, lined with various books, ornaments and pictures in frames. With a trembling hand, he reached out and took one frame down to study it more closely.

"No…...impossible…." he breathed, seeing two familiar faces beaming back at him.

Clara Oswald and Danny Pink, posing for a selfie in the middle of what appeared to be some kind of tree-lined park.

Setting the frame back where he'd found it, he took another one down. This time it was a picture of him and Clara, raising their champagne flutes to the camera in 'one last hurrah' aboard the Orient Express.

He shoved that picture quickly back on the shelf as well and turned to the coffee table, where he'd seen a pile of letters.

"Miss C. Oswald," he read aloud.

There could be no denying where he was. Or more specifically, where Aeryn had brought him.

He was in Clara's flat! Everything was untouched, just as she'd left it, waiting for her to come back. But of course, she never would. Unless...what if they were in the past, and Clara was still alive?

He licked his finger quickly and stuck it in the air, then licked it again to check the date, before collapsing back into the sofa and tossing the pile of letters angrily onto the coffee table.

21st November 2015. Two days before Clara's 30th birthday. But that wasn't the reason the Doctor was upset.

He was upset because 21st November 2015 was the day she died.

"Why are we here?" He shouted angrily to the motionless, still form of the TARDIS. "Why today?! WHY?! Is it not enough that I've endured it over and over in my mind? You have to torture and torment me even more, by bringing me back here?! Knowing that she's out there, right now, and she's going to walk into that trap street, and I can do nothing to save her?!"

He buried his head in his hands, fighting back tears of anger and grief then, completely forgetting who he had even come here with. Aeryn had wandered off, and he'd forgotten all about her.

The TARDIS gave a low groan as she appeared to settle down, waiting for a long spell of inactivity, and a light breeze from one of the windows, which was slightly ajar, blew the stack of envelopes onto the floor by the Doctor's feet. All save one.

One which caught his eye, as he looked up again and rubbed his face with one hand.

The envelope had his name on. Just his name. Nothing else. And it wasn't in a hand that he recognised.

His curiosity overcoming his grief momentarily, he reached out and took the envelope, tearing it open and pulling out four cards, about the same size and shape as the prompt cards that Clara had once made for him.

"Question 1," the first card read. "How can I remember meeting both you and Clara, when you can't remember meeting me?"

He turned it over, realising who the cards were from, and wondering when and where Aeryn had had the time to not only write them, but plant them here in the flat in the first place. Had she been here before? When?!

"Answer: You're a time traveller who goes back and forth and sideways in time. I travel the long way round, so it's entirely possible we met out of order. My past is your future, that hasn't happened yet."

Well, that strangely made sense. She'd figured that out by herself? Impressive. He set that card to one side, and looked to the next one.

"Question 2. If that is the case, and our encounter in my past is still to happen in your future, then how can Clara have been with you? She's gone….isn't she?"

Again, he turned the card over.

"Conjecture. What if she's not? Check the bedroom."

Not sure he wanted to believe that this was even happening, the Doctor rose slowly and did as the card suggested, following it's instructions as he walked through the flat, to what would have been Clara's bedroom. The door was closed, and he hesitated for a moment, but only a moment, before reaching out and turning the handle to push the door open, wondering what he'd find inside.

The room was dark, the curtains drawn closed, and he could barely see anything. So he flicked on the light.

And staggered back in shock, bracing himself against the doorway.

This was impossible, and brilliant, and wonderful and….completely, utterly impossible! He must be hallucinating. It was the only explanation. Because what he was seeing was so very wrong.

"This can't be," he breathed, pulling out his sonic shades and slipping back into the room again, standing at the end of the bed and scanning up and down, double, triple, quadruple checking the readings he was getting, and still not believing them.

The young woman tucked up in the bed wasn't a zygon, or a clone, or a doppleganger, or a shapechanger. She was most definitely human.

She only had mild concussion from a minor head trauma, but was otherwise unharmed.

She was most certainly alive, albeit unconscious.

She was so very impossible.

And she was Clara Oswald!

"Clara?" the Doctor breathed, suddenly overcome with emotion as he hurried round to the side of the bed before his knees buckled, and he dropped to the floor beside it. "My Clara?"

Reaching out a trembling hand, he touched hers as it lay prone on top of the bed cover, and as his skin made contact with hers, a charge of electric, like a static shock, snapped between them.

Clara's eyes fluttered slowly open.

"Doctor?" She groaned, dazed and disoriented as she tried to sit up. "Doct-ow!"

"It's all right, Clara. I'm here," he spoke gently as he whipped the shades off, stuffed them in his pocket and quickly fell into comfort mode – a mode he was not used to being in. Usually it was Clara who was the gentle one, and he was the rough, abrasive one. So this concept was an entirely new one to him, at least in this regeneration.

"Take it slowly. That's it." He adjusted and plumped up the pillows behind her head so that she was propped a little more upright. And then he carefully perched on the edge of the bed, taking her hand in both of his and giving it a gentle squeeze – partly to comfort her, but mainly to convince himself that this was very real, and very much happening. He wasn't dreaming, or hallucinating.

She was actually, really, truly there. Lying in bed, dazed and confused and very clearly having absolutely no idea which way was up, down, left or right, at that particular moment.

"How are you feeling?"

She reached up with her free hand to gently probe the cut on her temple, and the rapidly forming bruise. "Like I've done ten rounds with the Mire. What happened?"

What had happened indeed? If only he knew!

"You've got a thick skull," he commented, not really sure what else to say. "It's not cracked, but you should lie still for a time. At least until you get your balance back."

Clara, who'd been trying to get up again, flopped back into the mound of pillows with an exaggerated sigh. "And HOW did I almost get a cracked skull?"

"I don't know," he shook his head, even as he gave her hand another encouraging squeeze.

She gave him one of her big, wide eyed looks that begged 'please don't lump me in with the rest of the stupid humans. Please tell me the truth.'

"Doctor, what happened?"

"I'm telling you the truth now," he told her, deadly calm, deadly serious as he stood up and reluctantly let go of her hand, before leaning forward and gently brushing her hair to one side so he could study the cut more closely. "I honestly don't know. But I promise you, I'm going to find out."

She gazed up at him without saying a word, but he knew just from her look, that she believed him. She flinched when he pressed the bruising lightly, then bit her lip, but she didn't utter a word of protest.

It looked like she'd been hit round the head with a large, heavy object. But who would do that to her? And why?

Why knock her unconscious, then tuck her up in bed and make her comfortable? Why contradict their own actions?

He suddenly remembered the last two cards that had been in the envelop addressed to him. He hadn't read them yet. Maybe they held the answers? Aeryn had known that Clara was here, after all. But how could she have known? Unless she'd had anything to do with it? But when? And how?

Clara glanced to the clock on her bedside table as he stepped back away from the bed and pulled the cards from his pocket. But her gasp stopped him short.

"Oh my God, Rigsy! Is he ok?!"

She was already trying to get out of bed again, throwing the covers off and trying to sit back up. So the Doctor jammed the cards back into his pocket, then gently but firmly pressed her back into the pillows and pulled the cover over her again, lightly slapping her hand away when she tried to protest and pull them off once more.

"Local Knowledge is fine!" He insisted firmly. "Whilst you were having an afternoon siesta, I saved him and sent him on his way."

Clara looked to him for a beat or two longer, then once again decided that she believed him and allowed herself to sink back into the pillows. "So he's okay?"

"He's absolutely fine. Unlike you, who needs to rest!"

"And what about you?"

"I," he started, forcing himself to be bright and nonchalant, "need to go and put the handbrake on in the TARDIS. Otherwise she might end up wandering off to the middle ages again. Then I'm going to find out who did this to you, and more importantly why. And in the mean time, can I get you anything? Water? Tea? A magazine?"

"Tea would be good," she nodded, gently probing the side of her head to assess the damage herself, then wincing. "Some aspirin and an ice pack would also be appreciated."

"Yes Ma'am," he smiled and nodded, slipping from the room.

Instead of heading for the kitchen, however, he ran into the TARDIS, pulled out the final two cards and began to read them.

"By now I'm assuming you've found her, and if you haven't, what the hell is taking you so long, old man?!" He snorted in indignation at this, then carried on reading. "So, question three. How is this possible?"

He turned the card over.

"Answer: I might have taken a slight detour with the TARDIS after dumping the basilisk in that supernova – which is bloody gorgeous by the way! Most beautiful thing I've ever seen! But I'm deviating. The TARDIS helped me, but it's not her fault, so please don't blame her. If you're angry at anyone, be angry at me."

He threw the card over his shoulder now that he'd read it, and quickly went on to the last card.

"Final question: What if the Clara Oswald who walked into that trap street with you, wasn't Clara Oswald at all? What if the real Clara Oswald had always been lying in her own bed, waiting for you to get over your grief and find her again?"

Once more, he turned the final card over to read the last part on the back.

"Conjecture: If it wasn't Clara who walked into that trap street, then who was it? Well, I think you know the answer already, Doctor. Because if you're as smart as I know you are, then you'll have worked out that I've taken on the form of Clara once before. I hope I can be as convincing this second time round. So, it's been a real pleasure knowing you, and I honestly mean that. I wish our parting could have been under better circumstances, but I hope that one day you'll understand. Goodbye Doctor."

It had been signed in the bottom right hand corner by Aeryn, and she'd even drawn a smiley face beneath her name. But the Doctor wasn't smiling. How could he be?

He dropped the card to the floor and slammed a fist off the TARDIS console. He shouldn't be angry. He should be thrilled. Clara was alive! All this time he'd thought she was dead, and she wasn't! She was safe and, aside from being a little shaken, she was alive! So why was he angry?

But of course he knew why.

Clara's life had come at a price. One that he'd never been willing to pay. Yes, back on Gallifrey when he'd demanded the extraction machines to pull Clara from the seconds before what he'd assumed was her death, he'd shot the General with his own side arm. But the General was a Time Lord. He'd regenerated and learned from his – or rather her mistake now, not to cross the Doctor again. The Doctor hadn't been able to extract Clara from the Trap Street, but no-one had tried to stop him from stealing a TARDIS and leaving, either.

Now, though, Aeryn had taken the step to remove him from the decision altogether. She was foolishly throwing her life away, and unlike the General, she wouldn't regenerate. It was the end of the road, for her.

The TARDIS phone started to ring on the console, and he stared at it for a moment in surprise, then snatched it up.

"Hello?"

 _"_ _I'm sorry, Doctor."_ It was Aeryn. _"I know you're furious..."_

"Too right I am! What the hell are you playing at?!"

 _"I worked it out a long time ago,"_ she admitted.

"How long ago? And how did you get this number?!"

 _"I might have taken Clara's phone,"_ her voice had dropped low now, like she was trying not to be overheard. _"And I worked it out when you took me to the TARDIS for the first time. You remember when I woke up, you asked why my eyes had been leaking? Well the truth is, I'd had a dream. I saw what happens in that Trap Street. I saw what happens to Clara. And that's when it all fell into place. I realised it couldn't have been Clara. Because I know for a fact I've met Clara in the past. She gave me that iPod. I couldn't have imagined it because you saw it. You knew it belonged to her. And something she said to me way back then, only made sense after I'd had that dream. So I knew it had to have happened."_

"What did she say?" The Doctor asked quietly, leaning heavily against the console as the anger drained away and he rubbed his face with his free hand.

 _"That some day we'd meet again. And I'd save her life. When the raven called, I'd be there, and she'd be forever indebted to me."_

He let out a long, slow breath. "Aeryn, listen to me. Once you walk into that street, it's game over. You will die."

 _"I know."_

"And I can't save you."

 _"I'm not expecting you to. Doctor, we both know that if I don't do this, Clara will die. Please, don't try to talk me out of it. I've made my choice, and I've made my peace with that decision. Clara Oswald is brilliant, and brave, and strong. She's fierce, she's smart, and she's every bit your equal. I can never hope to be even half the woman she is, so I don't intend to be."_

"You severely underestimate yourself. You've survived your entire life up until this point – that's a hell of a long lifespan that not many in the Universe can relate to, yours truly not included, of course. You've survived traumas, heartbreak, devastation, the different phases of life. And here you are now. You should be congratulating yourself for being so amazing! Not comparing yourself to someone else and analysing the differences."

 _"Even so Doctor, this isn't about me. We both know that. And I've seen what you're like with her. You said it yourself. Without her, you're a mess, and it's not pretty. And believe me, I should know. You've been grieving for four weeks. I've been grieving for four centuries. That pain will never go away. When the grief fades and becomes a memory, it still hurts like hell. I told you back in the library that I'd endured. You said that enduring isn't living, and you're right. I can't go on like this any more Doctor, and I've been planning this for some time. But always, something got in the way, or I lost my nerve. Now though…..well now I have a chance to...to make it not such a selfish action. My death can bring about something good...it won't be wasted. It won't be in vain, and I can die with a clean conscience, knowing that Clara Oswald is alive, because of me."_

"Aeryn, at least think about what you're doing."

 _"I have, Doctor. Believe me, I've not made this choice lightly. But don't waste your breath. Nothing you say will make me change my mind now. And at least this way, I'll be with Maric again. So go and be with Clara. Live again, have fun, have adventures! Be a Doctor! And besides, this isn't goodbye. We'll meet again soon."_

"Right," he managed a small smile. "On your twelve hundred and twelfth birthday."

 _"Exactly. And I can promise you, it'll be one hell of a ride."_

"I look forward to it," he managed a bigger, more genuine smile now. "Aeryn -"

 _"Don't say goodbye, Doctor. We've done that already, remember? Before I face the raven, THAT'S when we'll say goodbye."_

"But I thought I was saying goodbye to Clara then."

 _"Will saying goodbye to me be any different?"_

He thought about it for a moment, and then sighed. "No, I suppose it won't. And I suppose all I have left to say…...is thank you."

Now it was her turn to be confused. _"What for?"_

"For working it out. For bringing her back to me. For being utterly amazing….for being yourself."

 _"That's a lot to be thankful for."_

"Like I said, you severely underestimate yourself. Aeryn?"

"Yes, Doctor?"

"You know how this ends. You know you won't be leaving that street alive. But no-one else knows that, and they can't know either. If anyone – especially myself – suspects anything at all, then time and history will be re-written. That can't happen."

 _"_ _I know,"_ she sounded like she was smiling and nodding. _"Like a small boat on the ocean, sending big waves into motion."_

"Yes, exactly like that. Ripples into tidal waves."

 _"Don't worry Doctor, I know how careful I'm gonna have to be. Now, you promise me you'll take care of her. You treasure each moment with her, and you look after her. Because I won't always be there to trade places with her."_

"Of course. You have my word."

 _"Then goodbye Doctor. See you again soon."_

"Goodbye Hoppity."

She chuckled at that, and even he managed a small grin.

He held onto the line for a moment longer, and before Aeryn hung up, he could hear a muffled sort of noise, followed by rapidly increasing footfalls. She was running now.

And then his voice, as she stopped, panting slightly. _"What happened to all the stuff I asked you to bring?"_

And then Aeryn's voice in reply. Or rather Clara's voice. _"Someone called you. Yesterday, 6am. Blocked number."_

That was it, the line went dead and he knew that she had now become Clara. There was no going back. She was going to play the part, she was going to walk into that trap street, she was going to save Rigsy, and she was going to die. And no-one, except him, would ever know the truth.

No, he would not let her be forgotten. He would remember her, and what she had done. And he would make sure Clara knew it too. Because Clara deserved to know the truth. She wouldn't like it, but she deserved to know it.

Rooting around on one of the shelves on the upper level, he quickly dug out the watch he'd invented to turn himself invisible, tucked it into his pocket then stepped back out of the TARDIS and into the kitchen.


	12. Face the Raven

It took him a while to find his way round Clara's kitchen (for a school teacher she was incredibly disorganised! He'd be having words with her about that!) but eventually he was able to make up a tray of 'goodies' that should hopefully cheer her up and make her feel better.

He poured the hot water from the kettle into two mugs, chucked a couple of teabags into each, splashed in an exact amount of milk, dropped two lumps of sugar into Clara's mug and five into his, then gave them both a quick blitz with the sonic shades to get the tea leaves infusing and releasing all their flavours.

Whilst this was going on, he found a packet of custard creams which he emptied onto a plate. That went onto the tray beside the two mugs. As did a glass of water, a packet of aspirin and a home-made ice pack, consisting of a packet of frozen peas wrapped in a tea towel.

Then came the precise and incredibly difficult task of retrieving the tea bags from the scolding mugs. As he was prodding and attempting to hook one of the teabags with a finger, wincing and yelping each time he touched the boiling water, he heard a soft chuckle from behind him, and his spirits soared as he turned to see Clara leaning against the door frame, watching him.

"Well look at you, being all domestic," she teased lightly.

By now, the Doctor had given up on using his fingers and had dug out his trusty table spoon, using that to fish out the teabags instead. Once done, he wagged it at her and she held her hands up defensively, well aware that a spoon was quite often his weapon of choice.

"You should be resting."

"I know, and I will. I just wanted to ask you about this." She held up a chess piece – the white queen – for him to see.

"You know I always beat you when we play chess," he shrugged, trying to act like it wasn't important as he turned back to the tray and fished out the other tea bag, plopping it to the side of the sink where he'd put the other one. So of course Clara knew, just from his reaction, that it WAS important.

"Only because you cheat," She smirked, trying to judge his reaction. "And this isn't an ordinary chess piece."

"It's not?" Dropping the spoon into the washing up bowl, he turned back to Clara to see her watching him curiously. "Looks pretty boring to me."

She stood and stared at him for a long moment, until eventually he couldn't stand it any longer.

"What?" He asked, picking up the tray to hide the fact that she was getting him all flustered. "What is it?"

"You," she told him as he shooed her out of the doorway then followed her into the living room.

"What about me?" He set the tray on the coffee table, then picked up the ice pack and as Clara flopped into the sofa, he started to fuss over her.

"You forget I know you, Doctor. I know when you're not – ow!" Her hand instinctively rose to slap the Doctor's own hand away as he pressed the ice pack a little too firmly to her head. He avoided the slap, then made her hold onto it instead. She huffed, but considering the ice was already helping to relieve the throbbing headache, she didn't protest at being made to hold it in place.

"When I'm not what?" He asked conversationally as he took her other hand and popped two aspirin from their silver foil packet into it, then as she tipped them into her mouth, he handed her the glass of water so she could wash them down.

"Thanks," she nodded once she'd finished with the water and passed it back to him. He set it back on the tray, then picked up the chess piece from where she'd sat it on the table, so that he could finally look at it, for the first time, noting the inscription which he'd seen but never actually stopped to read when Aeryn had shown it to him.

 _I might only have one match,_ _b_ _ut I can make an explosion._

"Doctor...what's going on?" Clara asked gently as she reached out her free hand and placed it on his cheek, regaining his attention as he looked to her, and noting the sudden sadness in his eyes. "Please tell me?"

"I don't know all the details," he admitted quietly, taking her hand from his cheek and holding it between both of his instead, pressing the chess piece into her palm lightly and curling her fingers round it for her to hold on to. "But as I told you, I'm going to find out."

"But you know some things. This chess piece was important to someone, and you know who. So tell me what you do know," she encouraged lightly.

He hesitated, holding her gaze for a short while and studying her big, round eyes. Did he have the heart to tell her? Did she really need to know?

A distant raven cawing outside the window caused him to flinch, and Clara looked to him with genuine concern then. "You're scared?"

"No," he shook his head and turned away from the window. "Not any more, no. Because for a very long time, I thought I'd lost you. I thought I would never see you again and those were the worst moments of my life, Clara. So yes, during that time, I was scared. But not any more."

"I'm here now, Doctor," she reassured him. "And I was only gone for an hour or so, surely?"

"Four months."

She blinked.

"Sorry, say that again?"

"Four months," he repeated. "Or four and a half billion years. Whichever way you want to view it."

"Four and a half billion…..Doctor, have I missed something here?" She sat up and adjusted the ice pack slightly, fixing him with her keen, intelligent gaze as she folded one leg beneath her to make herself more comfortable.

The raven cawed again – the street must have been closer to Clara's apartment than he'd realised. Either that or he was just hearing things. Imagining the sounds because of what he knew was happening right at that very moment in time. He glanced to Clara once more, and then crumbled, and the words were tumbling from his mouth before he could stop them.

He told her everything, from the moment they'd entered the Trap Street, to the moment he'd found her lying unconscious but very much alive in her own bed. He told her all about the raven and how he thought she'd been the one to face it. How he thought she'd died. How he'd spent the next four and a half billion years trapped in a never ending cycle within the confession dial. How he'd found himself on Gallifrey and how he'd taken his revenge against the President and the High Council, but how he'd failed to get to the extraction chamber to try and save her. How he'd then gone on travelling, running away from the pain until he'd finally met Aeryn, and she'd reminded him how to live again. She'd given him a purpose, and she'd helped him to forget his pain. And then she'd reunited him with Clara, though he still wasn't entirely sure how she'd done it. And how she was now taking Clara's place in the Trap Street. Just as she'd done all along. All this time he'd thought Clara had died. But she hadn't. It had been Aeryn, which in hindsight could have been why the Time Lords had refused to let him extract Clara from the Trap Street, because it wasn't actually her.

Clara sat and listened silently, and as the Doctor finished explaining, she reached up with her free hand and palmed away the tears on her cheeks.

"But...why would she do that?" She whispered, the ice pack dropping to the ground as she forgot all about it. "Why would she do that to herself? She didn't even know me! And you too! Four and a half billion years in that confession dial? I was dead and gone! Why? Why would you even do that to yourself?!"

"I had a duty of care," he told her simply.

She sniffed and wiped away a few more tears, then nodded. "And what's Aeryn's excuse?"

"She seemed quite fond of you," he smiled sadly. "When you meet her, you make a hell of an impression."

"When I meet her?" Clara's eyes brightened a little at this. "What do you mean?"

"Our future is her past. We've met each other out of order – perils of being a time traveller and all. But one day we'll gatecrash her birthday. She won't know us, but she'll learn to. And whatever we do, we leave an impression that sticks with her for over a thousand years."

"That's a hell of an impression," Clara managed a light smile.

"Well what do you expect? We're the stuff of legends, you and I."

This did make her laugh, and then she winced and probed her temple gently again, remembering too late that she still wasn't completely healed, despite the aspirin and the ice. She picked up her tea and took a few sips – it was good tea. The Doctor always knew how to make it just right.

"So….what do we do now?"

"Well I don't know about you," the Doctor continued, "But I'm finding myself more and more curious about just how she did it. Not only saved your life, but reunited the two of us again."

He pulled out the watch from his jacket pocket and showed it to her. "Want to be a fly on the wall? Or should I say, the invisible woman?"

"Hell yes," Clara smiled properly now, taking the watch and knowing exactly what he had in mind.

...

Fifty eight minutes earlier…

"Doctor, you're being really weird!" Clara protested as she was herded into her own flat by a very impatient Doctor.

"You have three mirrors, colour your face in, think it's hilarious to dangle out the open doors of the TARDIS above London and wear stilts to put up shelves, yet I'M the one who's being weird?!"

He was already rifling through her bookshelf, but she had absolutely no idea what he was looking for.

"Doctor, we should be helping Rigsy," she sighed, folding her arms and knowing there was no use trying to argue with him. He was in one of those moods, it seemed.

He pulled Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets from the shelf and smiled at it for a moment, then set it to one side and carried on searching about the rest of the room now that what he was looking for apparently wasn't on the bookshelf.

"Doctor?" She snapped when he continued to ignore her. "Doctor!"

"Yes, yes, Local Knowledge," he nodded distractedly as he picked up a wrench and frowned at it, then held it up to her, the unspoken question burning in his eyes.

Clara sighed. "The sink was leaking, so I borrowed it from Trevor next door. Haven't got round to returning it yet. But focus, please! Rigsy?!"

"I'm getting to that," the Doctor waved a hand dismissing her concerns as he wandered from the room, wrench still in hand. She followed him down the hall and into her bedroom, as he continued speaking, apparently to her, though she couldn't always tell when he was in one of these moods.

"Where do you keep it?"

"Keep what?" She huffed impatiently, storming into her bedroom. "And you remember when we talked about you invading my private space? This whole room is my private space!"

She found him standing in front of her dressing table, staring at himself in the three mirrors. Then he looked down to the wrench in his hand, testing it's weight.

"Whatever you're thinking of doing, don't!" Clara pointed an accusing finger at him. "Don't you dare! I'm warning you! I will slap you so hard you'll regenerate if you even consider breaking anything!"

"I want to say this won't hurt, but that would be a lie," he said quietly, turning to her. "I'll try not to hurt you too much, though."

"Hurt me?" She asked, a sudden cold chill running down her spine at the look he was giving her now, equal parts pain and guilt.

"I'm sorry Clara, but I can't let you leave this room."

She collapsed to the floor, a trickle of blood already running down the side of her face from where the wrench had connected.

"I am truly sorry, believe me, but short of locking you in or tying you up, at the risk of you picking the lock and getting out again anyway, this was the only way I could ensure your safety," the Doctor spoke again as he dropped the wrench then crouched down and checked the side of her neck for a pulse. Then, when he found one, he scooped her into his arms and laid her in the bed, fussing about with the pillows to make sure she was comfortable. Or as comfortable as she could be, considering.

Once this was done, the Doctor stepped back, closed his eyes….and Aeryn staggered, quickly gripping the bedside table for support as all the wounds she'd sustained from her impromptu cliff diving experience came back to haunt her with a vengeance.

Once the wave of nausea from the pain had subsided and she wiped the trail of blood from her nose, she reached into the pocket of her jeans and pulled out the vial of healing water, plus a wad of cotton padding from the first aid kit she'd found in the compartment of Desert Thunder, and sitting herself on the edge of the bed, she emptied the vial onto the cotton padding, allowing it to soak in so that none of it was wasted.

"Even if right now you don't understand...even if right now you don't believe it, or can't believe it...some day you'll thank me for this," she told Clara's unconscious form as she gently pressed the soaked cotton to the side of her head, over the gash and the already forming bruise. "And you'll have to trust that I know what I'm doing. I know the consequences."

She held the padding in place for several minutes, then removed it to check the gash. Already she could see that it was little more than a hairline cut now, though the bruising was still violent and black. But there hadn't been enough water left in the vial to heal it completely. Still, Aeryn had done all she could, and with any luck the bruising would go down fairly quickly, and the headache Clara would inevitably wake up with wouldn't be too bad. She hoped.

Pulling herself slowly back to her feet and gritting her teeth against the pain, she hobbled from the room, removing any evidence that she'd ever been in the flat at all, except for the letter to the Doctor, which she set on the table in the living room for him to find. Then she hurried towards the front door as an unexpected wind quickly picked up in the front room, accompanied by a rasping, grating sound.

 _"Well this wasn't what I was expecting. I thought we were going to a concert, or something?"_ Her future self spoke as she and the Doctor stepped from the TARDIS.

 _"Are we in the right place?"_

 _"How should I know? You're the driver!"_

 _"I'm gonna have a look around."_

Her future self - who she was glad to see was fully healed again and dressed in fresh clothing - stepped from the front room into the hall, and looked straight towards her past self, nodded in recognition and...was that appreciation? She couldn't really understand her own facial expressions, but then again she'd never truly tried before. Then her future self carried on into Clara's bedroom. Her past self limped and hobbled out of the flat before she could be spotted by the Doctor, and when she was sure no-one was looking, transformed into Maric, knowing full well that nobody would recognise him, so that she could make it quickly back to where she'd parked the TARDIS.

Her future self, meanwhile, had checked that Clara was all right, then pulled the chess piece out and set it on the bedside table for Clara to find when she woke. "Sorry, but I need your phone. I'll make sure you get it back, though," she whispered, tucking Clara's mobile into her pocket and then heading back out into the hallway, sticking her head round the doorway of the living room. "Oh and maybe you should make sure whoever lives here knows we're here. I'd imagine they might not be too happy at the mess you've made."

With any luck, he'd go searching the flat for the occupant and find Clara that way. But if not, there was always the letter.

Hurrying out the front door, she headed in the same direction as her past self, before diverting off down a side alley and cutting a few corners to end up back in the place where she'd intercepted Clara in the first place and convinced her, in the guise of the Doctor, to go back to her flat under the pretence of locating something to help them, but in reality this being just a ruse to get her off the streets of London and into the safety of her own home once more.

For Clara, that wouldn't have been more than ten, possibly fifteen minutes at most, but for Aeryn it had been several hours. Still, she'd very gently and carefully probed Clara's mind when she was checking on her, so she'd refreshed herself on exactly what it was that Clara had been doing, where she'd been going and why. Now, after one final phone call to make sure the Doctor had found her little clues she'd left for him, she was ready to step into Clara's shoes and pick up where she left off.

She was completely oblivious as she ended her call to the Doctor and slid into Clara's form, that she'd been followed the entire time.

...

Clara, meanwhile, saw it all. She saw the woman who had saved her life, and she saw how it had happened. The Doctor's watch was keeping her invisible, and the sonic shades he'd leant to her meant that back in the TARDIS, he could see it all too.

As Clara watched herself, or rather Aeryn posing as her, enter the Trap Street with the others, she hesitated.

"Clara, come back now. You don't need to see any more," the Doctor spoke quietly into her ear. "You don't need to see what happens next."

"I know," she agreed quietly, still hesitating. Still uncertain. "But..."

"No buts Clara. You know what's going to happen. You don't need to see it. Nobody should have to see it, in fact."

"Doctor, I can't just leave her," Clara muttered quietly. "She's going to die because of me. How can I just turn and walk away from that?"

"You can't save her. Time is a very fragile thing, and this is a fixed moment. Break it, and ripples become tidal waves. Time itself will fracture."

"I know. I'm not going to stop it. Wouldn't even know how. But, I can at least be there with her in the end, can't I? Just for a minute? She shouldn't have to do it alone."

He sighed. "One minute. That's all. And don't let anyone see you!"

"Thought that's why you gave me the watch?" She replied with a wry smile as she stepped into the street.

"Don't run," the Doctor, his eyes red and his voice full of emotion, was attempting a light smile as he and Clara faced one another in Mayor Me's house.

"Nah," Aeryn as Clara shook her head, appreciating his gesture and managing a smile of her own, even as she declined his offer like he'd just asked her for nothing more than to join him for a walk in the rain. "You stay here. In the end, everybody does this alone."

"Clara-" the Doctor started to once again protest, but she couldn't let him. She wasn't Clara, of course, and whatever he wanted to say to Clara should be said to Clara, and Clara alone. Not a stranger like her.

Besides, she was absolutely, bloody terrified, because she knew what was coming next, and if he said whatever it was that he was about to say, then she might just bottle it completely. Lose her nerve. She'd come too far for that to happen.

"This is as brave...as I know how to be..." she admitted then, with absolute honesty. "I know it's going to hurt you, but...please..."

A lone tear broke free and trailed down her cheek, unchecked. But she didn't care. Given the circumstances it was to be expected after all.

"Be a little proud of me?" This was just as much a message for his future self, as it was a message from Clara to him now.

She reached up and placed a hand on his cheek to try and offer some form of comfort to the devastated Time Lord. He took her hand and held it in both of his instead, then raised it up and kissed her fingers, so gently, so tenderly, with so much love and affection that she very nearly crumbled once more. She had to get out of there. She had to do this now.

She wasn't going to run.

Clara wouldn't have done that, so neither would she.

"Goodbye Doctor." As the raven called, she turned away, then with a deep breath and a determined nod to herself that she could do this, she strode from the house with as much courage and dignity as she could manage.

"Let me be brave," she whispered to herself, urging one foot in front of the other. "Let me be brave."

The raven landed on a stall at the far end of the street, and she froze, her feet not allowing her to move any further. This would be it then. This would be where she made her final stand. "Let me be brave," she uttered one last time, opening her arms wide – an invitation to get it over and done with quickly. The raven didn't disappoint, and swooped low, hitting it's mark with pinpoint accuracy, and such a force that Aeryn almost staggered backwards.

Almost.

From the doorway, the Doctor watched on in horrified silence as Clara's screams filled the night air, echoing around the street. They lasted a couple of seconds, perhaps ten at the very most, but for the Doctor it was a sound that lasted an eternity and would haunt him for a long time to come.

And Clara herself, invisible and pressed against a nearby wall, had to clamp a hand over her mouth to stop from crying out and sobbing aloud at what she was seeing.

When the smoke had gone, and the Doctor had been summoned back inside to face Ashildr, or Mayor Me as she was now styling herself, the Doctor's voice spoke in Clara's ear.

"If you want to be with her, now's your only chance."

Clara took the hint and ran over, dropping to her knees beside the fallen body on the cold cobbles. But the form lying on the cobbles now was no longer Clara. She'd lost control of her powers and reverted to her true form. Clara reached out a trembling hand and picked up Aeryn's own, feeling her wrist for a pulse. There was one, but it was only very fleeting and was rapidly failing. So, switching the watch off, Clara made herself once more visible.

Aeryn, feeling the touch on her hand, opened her eyes painfully, expecting to see the Doctor. Her eyes struggled to focus for a moment, before settling on Clara in confusion. And then surprise and finally joy.

"Hi," she rasped weakly, when recognition finally dawned. "You...you shouldn't be here...if anyone...finds you..."

"I know," Clara nodded as more tears splashed down her cheeks. She forced a smile regardless as she gripped Aeryn's hand tighter. "But I couldn't let you die alone, could I? The Doctor told me everything."

"I'm glad….you're….safe…." Aeryn wheezed, gripping Clara's hand weakly. "Promise me….you'll…." she choked and gagged for a moment.

"I'll what?" Clara prompted gently. Aeryn looked to her through glassy eyes, and Clara knew she was very nearly gone. She had just enough time to choke out one final word.

"...Live..."

Her hand fell limp in Clara's own, and her head drifted to one side as the last breath escaped her. Clara reached out her other hand and closed Aeryn's eyes gently with a finger and thumb, then turned the watch back on quickly as the door of Mayor Me's house opened again and Rigsy stepped out tentatively, to see for himself what had gone on. But before he could get a proper look and see that it wasn't Clara lying on the cobbles now, Me herself had come out and was ushering him towards the exit of the street, stating that he was free to go. He didn't want to, and kept trying to look back over his shoulders, protesting, but Me was quite insistent and when Rump came forward to escort him, he finally gave up, realising he had no choice.

Clara stayed beside Aeryn for a while longer, holding her hand, but as some of the street's occupants finally came out to see what had happened, she knew that she couldn't stay there any longer. Slipping her phone back from Aeryn's pocket, she stood up and reluctantly left the street, heading back for the TARDIS, where the Doctor was waiting for her.

She didn't remove the watch, or the invisibility cloak it was generating, until she was back inside the TARDIS however. The Doctor didn't even look up from the console, as he spoke, his knuckles white from where he was gripping it so hard.

"I've contacted Me. Explained everything, and made arrangements for her to be taken home, for burial."

Clara nodded, but had found that somewhere on the lonely walk back to the TARDIS, she'd lost her voice. She sniffed, fighting back the tears again, and finally the Doctor looked up. Then in a move so uncharacteristic of him, he held out his arms to her.

She didn't hesitate and ran into them willingly, breaking down in trembling, choking sobs as he held her tightly to him and didn't say another word.


	13. Epilogue

The Doctor dropped Clara off to visit her Father and her Gran for her thirtieth birthday, though she didn't protest because it had been a while since she'd last seen either of them, and Aeryn's actions had reminded her that life was too short and she didn't know when she might get the chance again.

So whilst she was celebrating with tea, cake and gift wrapped presents, the Doctor went back to the Trap Street and as promised, found Aeryn's body ready for transportation back to Elysium. Ashildr/Me watched him calmly, trying to judge him and his reaction as he picked up Aeryn's body carefully in his arms. He remembered the threats he'd made towards the immortal woman before he'd been transported into his own personal torture chamber within the confession dial, and whilst she at least had the decency to look chagrined and sheepish about the whole situation, he still found that he was furious with her for her entire deception in the first place. He'd blamed her for Clara's death, when really he should be blaming her for Aeryn's. Because it was, as far as he was concerned, all Ashildr's fault that he was now having to take the Caerleon home to be buried in her family crypt.

The thought, of course, had never even occurred to him that perhaps it was also partly his fault for asking Aeryn to accompany him in the first place. If he hadn't...if he'd left her on Elysium...well then he'd still be mourning over Clara. So he'd still be to blame. Which was why it was easier to shift that blame onto Ashildr instead.

Without a single word to the viking girl, he turned and stalked out of her house, back to the TARDIS, where he lay Aeryn reverently in the chair where she'd once sat to watch him, so full of life as they'd worked out how to save the day. Together.

Now, she looked asleep. Peaceful and serene.

After taking her home and explaining what had happened to her father – how she'd died saving a friend and had been incredibly brave, even till the end – the Doctor was amazed to find that her father had been expecting it all along. Apparently during her chat with her father before she'd run off with the Doctor, she'd told her father what she was planning, and he'd been unable, just as the Doctor had been unable, to talk her out of it.

In the end he'd been forced to say goodbye, knowing that the next time he saw her would be at her funeral. But any animosity he might have once felt for the Doctor had also vanished now, and if anything his daughter's death had finally prompted the Governor to be a better man. He promised that from now on, he would follow her example and lead his people as he should always have done from the very beginning, with love and respect. Something Aeryn had understood all along, but he had failed to until it was too late.

After leaving Elysium, the Doctor returned to Clara's flat just ten minutes after he'd dropped his friend off for her birthday. This meant that for a time, he and Clara were able to forget their sadness about what had happened, as they, along with her father and grandmother shared a very happy afternoon together, laughing and telling jokes, eating cake and a selection of other nibbles that Clara's Gran had brought along for the occasion, and watching as Clara blew out the candles on top of her cake to an unusual rendition of 'Happy Birthday', complete with guitar solo by the Doctor.

She then opened her gifts with equal parts joy and surprise over each one - a new handbag and matching purse from her father, a hamper of chocolates and other goodies from Trevor and his wife next door, along with a chocolate wrench which was meant to be a joke, but which the Doctor and Clara actually found was a little too soon to be joking about just yet (Clara still had the bruise to prove it), a stack of first edition Jane Austen novels from the Doctor, signed to Clara by the author herself, plus a bottle of wine, a bunch of flowers and a box of chocolates from her colleagues at Cole Hill and some vouchers for her favourite clothes shop from her Gran.

When it was time for her father to take her Gran home, Clara gave them both an extra big hug and a kiss on the cheek, which they thought was odd but pleasantly sweet of her, and finally when it was all over, she and the Doctor slumped back down on her sofa together, content and full, nursing mugs of fresh tea.

"Well, your Gran knows how to make a good sponge," the Doctor smiled, making a point of patting his stomach. "Though I'm finding I'm still a little peckish."

"Still?" Clara asked incredulously, her eyebrows rising in disbelief. "Doctor, I've never seen anyone eat as much as you have today!"

"Even so," he shrugged, sitting forward and looking to her eagerly. "I hear the cakes in Elysium are particularly fulfilling."

She also sat forward, her curiosity piqued. "What are you saying?"

"That we've got another birthday to attend. No invites, of course. We don't need them. Because we're gonna crash it in style. What do you say?"

"Count me in," Clara grinned, taking his hand without hesitation and allowing him to lead her into the TARDIS, already looking forward to their next grand adventure.

As the ancient time machine took off, her birthday cards blew off the shelf where she'd decided to display them, and the leftovers sat idly on the table, along with the still steaming mugs of tea, waiting for her to come back and clean them up again. Whenever that might be.

Clara wasn't even thinking of that now as she helped the Doctor to pilot the TARDIS off into the Vortex once more, heading for Elysium and somebody's twelve hundred and twelfth birthday.


End file.
